Reading Catalan Novels Under Darkening Skies, Pt. I
By Felix Purat

I sip several Irish coffees in unison,
hanker for an onion bagel as
minutes streaming by are spent
seeking meaning hidden in
Catalan novels, constructed
under cultural duress;

uncertainty breeds mothballs
white paper that now crinkles in
a Chilton Alley dumpster,
looming among threads
maneuvered by way of
Athenian shuttles that dance to
forbidding rembetika tunes,
tinkling and broken upon their landings carved into my polluted ears
while eyes scout trails of granulated tinsel scattered through forests
nourished by Rodoreda’s dead.