Dear Zeze’s one and only Mister Portuga,
My teacher asked about Papa and
Got a packed lunch from Mama, but the next day
He left a thick book only in the next desk over.
So I tear out the last page and go
To Lisbon
To the bookstore LerDevagar
The workwoman who bikes across the store each day
Wrote poetry and was fired from the print shop, they say
Against the screaming pages
Her fingertips come into bloom
When her feet hum round and round the pedals
Songs in canon rouse from slumber to form a path
I cut the wire around my chest
And put up my hair in a gentle bun
When the sun shines at a three o’clock tilt
The scenery hiding underfoot unwraps its belt
A shadow has sunk its teeth into my dusty feet
And when its slant leans to the left
I take one slow stroll around the bookstore
In the bookshelf, three sections from the leftmost end
I’ll hide two books, and between the pages will be
Dried carnations once slipped into the muzzles of guns
I’ll ask for an Espresso• with one drop of ink
Only when the dust peeled naked by the sun
Falls onto the shattered mirror
Sound out my name backwards, Dear Mister Portuga
The name my teacher never said
And meet me at three o’clock
At the LerDevagar bookstore
•The LerDevagar bookstore was once a print shop, where the first issue of the Portuguese newspaper Espresso was printed. It was also the epicenter of the bloodless 1974 revolution known as the CarnationRevolution.
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