Free The Lightning Dreamer by Margarita Engle Page B

nineteen, he became a founder
of
los Soles y Rayos—
the Suns and Rays
of Bolívar, a secret society of poets
and artists who hoped to establish
a democratic nation of equals,
with no masters or slaves,
and one vote per man,
dark or light.

Tula
I will never grow tired
of exploring Heredia’s poetry.
    Â 
Here is a verse
about being at sea
alone
in a storm.
    Â 
And here is one about hiking
beside an immense waterfall
called Niágara.
    Â 
And listen to this poem
about refusing to accept
the existence of slavery
and refusing to see all of nature
as good and beautiful,
with the sole
exception
of human nature.

Caridad
Heredia is pale
and has always been free,
just like Tula.
    Â 
Somehow, with words
from wild poems
floating
all around me,
I feel certain that words
can be as human
as people,
alive
with the breath
of compassion.

Tula
Whispered words
about the Suns and Rays
continue to fascinate me.
The nuns tell me that Heredia’s
secret society had even designed
a flag—deep blue, with a gold sun
at the center, and a human face
on the sun, to remind us that people
can glow.
    Â 
Each ray of the round sun
is just a narrow sliver,
but together
all the tiny rays
join to release
a single
enormous
horizon of light.

Tula
Heredia’s poems haunt me.
From my room, I watch the march
of chained slave children
as they pass beyond
the carved
wooden bars
of my window.
    Â 
In the kitchen, I listen
to the knife-beat
spoon-beat
pounding
songs
of Caridad.
    Â 
Then I eat my guilty dinner,
wondering how many slaves
Mamá will buy with the money
she gains by marrying me to
the highest bidder.

Tula
At night, the view
from my window changes.
    Â 
Horses gallop
along the cobblestones.
    Â 
There are gunshots
and screams.
    Â 
Will there be another
rebellion
with heads
paraded on stakes
and hands
nailed to trees?

Tula
When no one is watching,
I carry a basket of fruit
on my head, just to find out
how it feels to need
balance.
    Â 
I chop an onion.
Stir a soup.
Sweep a floor.
Frown.
    Â 
Then I fill the air of the garden
with Heredia’s floating rhymes,
and soon I’m reciting a few poems
of my own, while Caridad
listens
beneath the silent
moon and stars.

Tula
Visions! The night is filled
with fierce spirits and gentle ones.
Invisible beings spin and moan.
Floor, ceiling, and walls
whisper, wail, and shout . . .
Phantoms beg me to transform
my strange dreams
into stories.
Words burst
and fly
past trees
in the garden.
I rise up out of a nightmare
and grasp a feather pen,
feeling winged.

Manuel
Feather pens, flowing ink,
and weightless paper
all mean
nothing at all to me.
    Â 
So I give them away
to my sister, who claims
she feels trapped
and can free herself only
with words.

Tula
When we visit my grandfather
on his sugar plantation,
I see how luxurious
my mother’s childhood
must have been,
surrounded by beautiful
emerald green sugar fields
harvested
by row after row
of sweating slaves.
    Â 
How can one place
be so lovely
and so sorrowful
all at the same time?

Tula
My grandfather speaks
of the various noblemen
he might select for me
next year, when I reach
the dreaded age
of fourteen.
    Â 
Twice, my mother defied her father
in order to marry for love, but now
she expects me to regain her place
in my grandfather’s will
by marrying a stranger
in exchange
for gold.

Tula
On our last day in the countryside,
my grandfather gives me a cruel gift:
    Â 
a yellow songbird
flapping helplessly
inside a delicate
bamboo cage.
    Â 
The captive bird’s
graceful wings
are useless.
    Â 
All it can do is flutter
and sing.

Tula
My pen is empty.
I cannot write.
    Â 
All I do is watch
my caged goldfinch
and listen to his brave
little song.
    Â 
I have discovered injustice,
but what good is a witness
who cannot testify?
    Â 
I am silent.
Useless.
My voice
has vanished.
    Â 
Will I ever learn how to sing
on paper?

Tula
My indoor world of walls
grows so quiet that I have to create
my own