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Poetry

Two Poems from Ecuador

by Mónica Ojeda

translated by Kymm Coveney

Delicate illustrations of butterflies — Photo by Museums Victoria / Unsplash.com

[And Mama told me]

And Mama told me:

“I’ll have a broken daughter
and I’ll comb her hair with all my teeth

I’ll show her
how hard it is to put on her shoes
and wash her face
so she’ll be clean
to see the butterflies in summer

I’ll show her
how scalpels shine

I’ll invite her
to the circus of the soiled eggshells
breaking apart

and when
broken from rebirth
she asks to be unborn
as all broken daughters do

I’ll open my legs:
I’ll invite her to be reincarnated
to go back to the first cry

the only one
the one she doesn’t sew up”

[This is the story of a leaf’s persistence]

This is the story of a leaf’s persistence. The leaf is my sick heart guarding Mabel’s corpse. I guard my sister from the scorpions and bury her in my bones to toughen me with her words of goodness. I feed her decapitated wrists and lose them in the squall

My sick heart is crawling

My mother’s eyes shatter facing the twilight of her lifedaughter forever anchored to mine. I'm acquainted with the saliva she spits at me and I kill it in the family firing line

My sick heart is crawling

My heart is a feverish tomb where the thought of Mabel expands. Her head bounces off the darkness: my mother’s eyelid flutters against the window of this crime [LOOK AT MY HANDS | GNAWING AT LUMINOUS CELESTIAL BODIES | TO LIGHT UP WITH HOLES OF TIME BELONGING TO YOU.] Her eyes are jellyfish cleansing the night and the profound intimacy of grief

[Within my love, a long time ago, I found a chrysalis. It pulsed like a verse crossing the breath of beauty. Healed the wounds of fish. Over the years it turned into an ulcer; learned to hurt and filled the honesty in my words with scabs. My love then began to rot from the vibrations of a shot-up chrysalis in my love’s throat, in my love’s eyes, in my love’s hands. But in the squall nothing trembles if our branch trembles not]

My eyes have rolled back into the depths of myself
searching for the truth of what is forbidden

Mabel’s body splits open and is a jawbone cackling its hurt

Mabel’s body splits open and is a jawbone biting its glory

Translations from the Spanish

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More by Mónica Ojeda

More Poetry

November 2025

In its November 2025 issue, World Literature Today showcases World Lit in the Age of AI with striking cover art by Sasha Stiles and an essay about her ongoing poem-in-residence project at MoMA. The rest of the AI special section gathers a thought-provoking mix of essays, fiction, creative nonfiction, and an interview + more than thirty reviews offering a global roundup of the best new books, the November issue is your perfect companion to a round-the-world reading tour.