Amanda

by Ivan A. Salazar M.

Amanda, singer of strings and night,

your guitar strangles the moon and kisses it,

splits the earth in two like an open mouth

where I drink the salt of your voice.

Night-singer, shadowed nightingale,

you unweave the silhouette of silence

with fingers that know the map of fire;

each note is a root that pulls me down.

Your song is a sea that names the stones,

a knife of light that cleaves the hours,

and I, humble ash that listens to you,

become a bird in the palm of your hand.

Amanda, braids of wind and candle,

when you sing the world tilts and throbs,

the ships return to their water-rib cages,

the mountains part to hear you.

Sing, for your voice is oath declared:

that night be window and not defeat,

that from the body's song the dawn be born,

and that your fingers, always, redeem my shadow.