SandScript 2023 [Digital Exclusive]

write a few numbers on a small notepad but
didn't divulge in writing stories. My pencil
bag was a shark with a zipper that opened
his belly, where I stored my writing utensils.
Pencils, pens, highlighters, erasers, and
so on. Tools I used to write essays good
enough to score a passing grade. I learned
that my dad kept his books and writing
utensils in the back of his truck, they came in
weird shapes and sizes. Personally... I don't
like carrying a pencil that weighs 8 pounds,
has a long chipped wooden handle prone to
gifting splinters, and has a flat blade.
Unfortunately, the story my dad wanted
to write had a trench 4 feet deep and 3.5
feet wide. It would seem an obvious and
easy task to hold a pencil correctly and
write. Children learning have a hard time
even correctly grabbing the pencil. My
muscle memory for shoveling was nonexistent.
I had to learn to use my writing
tool efficiently. A week into our project, I
could feel every fiber of muscle in my lower
back, I could shovel, I could write the same
language in which my dad wrote and read,
and I shoveled for hours. My dad used
more complicated tools and techniques,
he selected his letters and words, and the
cement I was taught to make helped put
them together. His personality resonated
through the figurative language he
cemented into his writing. I read it as we
wrote. With each week, each day, each hour,
each minute, I read a story that no figurative
language could translate.
He dug his way out. He dug his way, not like
me, and I'm sure not like anyone else did.
He dug his whole life, using weirdly shaped
pencils, and learned to read a book without
pages. He dug through the dirt so I could
dig through books with pages. He dug until
he could feel every muscle fiber on his back,
so I could feel a backpack on mine, filled
with books, with pages.
§
LA LUNA, TU Y YO
Fer Cueva
la luna con su noche nos arropo
mientras nos acercábamos
lentamente
a la intimidad
gozando del momento
presencia pura
fue ella quien vio que estábamos a punto de probarla
y nos quedamos esperando
sintiendo que no llegaría
que en esa noche al menos no sería
quedamos colgados en palabras
dichas entre líneas
mientras saboreábamos un que si sí
y me pregunto
¿la luna sabía el nosotros que existía?
translation
78
THE MOON, YOU AND ME
the moon with her night wrapped us in
as we got closer
slowly
into intimacy
enjoying the moment
pure presence
it was she who saw that we were about to taste it
and we just waited
feeling that it wouldn’t arrive
that at least on that night it wouldn’t be
we got hung up on words
said between lines
while we savoured a what if
and i ask myself
did the moon know the we that existed between us?