Marguerite Guzman Bouvard
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Marguerite Guzman Bouvard is the author of 5 books and 2 chapbooks of poetry including the prize winning Journeys Over Water. She is a former professor of Political Science and Poetry Workshops. She is also the author of several books on human rights. Her poetry and articles have been widely anthologized.
Click here to read a review of "The Unpredictability of Light"
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Blessings
for Valeria Guzman
Because she bought me books
when we had no money:
fairy tales from around the world,
astronomy books I took to her office
on Saturdays when I was only eight years old
and pretended I understood.
Because she took me to museums
when we had no money
and when we had a little more
she bought me a kiln
never minding when I scarred the rug.
Because she bought me books,
for Christmas, letting me choose
so I could learn my own lessons.
Because she let me be,
let me spend hours gazing
at the trees stitching earth and sky,
the mysteries unfolding from galaxies
of buds while she came home
from long days at work only to begin
again. Because she always kept the windows
open and never shut doors,
or tried to make me stay,
my mother is still there: her gentle voice,
her strong hands still guiding us all,
and also the trees, the maples’
jeweled arms in fall,
the elms inscribing their blue
calligraphy over snow,
the wonders spilling out
as she bent over her drawings
and her old singer sewing machine.
The important thing
is to give with abandon
and when you are the most naked, so that your hunger
turns into fields of gleaming fruit trees
and your frail and aging body
harbors a spirit that dwarfs mountains,
so that your giving is a path
towards endless vistas like the dying man
telling his art student
during her very last visit, “If only
I had a few pears I could paint.”
She thought it was to assuage
her grief, yet when he died, the pears
began to bloom on her canvases
with the quivering of new flesh, the sad
flames of sunset, the translucence
of tears. Like the woman in a Hungarian
prison whose birthday gift
to her cell mate was a rose made
out of toilet paper, a flower that survived
her execution. The important thing
is to give, randomly
and out of poverty, not knowing
whether the heart’s pale shoots
will create leaves or perish.
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