Poems From Asturias
i. AUBADE
The bus rolls between the fields, the muddy corrals
that huddle round Candás, the windows slick with a film
of morning breath. A stooping farmhand plants his hoe
by the foot of his hórreo, dwells on a silent prayer to welcome
in the morning. Buildings stretch; sunlight seeks out space
like rivers through the streets. The hour turns syrupy, as tea
soaks into water, and the lift of shutters grows like applause
to the lug and swell of the encroaching sea. The smell
of bakeries opening: palmeras, casadielles, marañuelas
goldening in knots, windowsills where black pudding purples
in its own broth. White husks of seeds spatter washed pavements
like manna and the day’s first song rises from the fluty whistle
of the afilador, the chatter of cutlery drawers catching his ears,
his eyes adjusting from the dark, his fingers yet unscathed.
ii. MARAÑUELAS
When the fishermen anchor down
and finish up their meal, their boat
snagging on each wave, they drown
the nets and watch them bloat
in the tug of the sea. Fingers cleave
to long-cold mugs and, having no
food left, the sailors retrieve,
as an afterthought, the prized tin
of marañuelas. Each man receives
the shape baked for him,
twisted neat. Warm with pride
he totters the boat’s rim,
each loving sway of the tide,
carrying his golden home-knot,
fingerprints baked into the side.