by Mireya Perez Bustillo
I will speak to you
who came from far
to this my Avila
to see my dried up sandal
and my defiant bone,
my right middle finger,
the only one not stolen by the
Holy Fathers for their reliquaries.
see, this relic of my flesh
desecrated by this emerald, that Indians
died for, that I never wore in life.
Do you see this spot? Here he
came to me and it was sweetness.
What do you think was that
fragrance lingering in my inviolate
body that so drew the clerics?
His fragrance in me.
You call me Santa. What did
I do? All I wanted was to
fight the Moors as in the romances
of chivalry and to have a swain
rescue me from the crenellated heights.
I was just a woman whose dream came true.
Mireya Perez Bustillo: Mireya’s poems invoke a powerful array of spirits. Her poetry appears in Caribbean Review, IRP Voices, Anthology of Colombian Women Poets, among others.