Leonora Simonovis

Conversations Between Former Revolutionaries

Caracas, Venezuela, March 2019

Listen a red beret is not a trend 
but a uniform, which is man and gun 
and maybe a song with the word freedom 
between two front teeth, like mango tendrils 
you understand?

Listen Luisa’s boy hungry     pul led 
a burger wrap from the trash. I saw 
the ketchup on it. And I’m telling 
you hunger cannot be wiped away 
with tongue.

Listen I saw soldiers thrift bullets 
from the morgue where bodies 
entwine in one last embrace. 
Cold bodies. Unwritten. Have 
you ever held a gun? Is it sorrow heavy,

does the trigger leave you breathless? 
Listen, the problem is not the uniform,
the burger wrap, the lack of bullets. 
It is the song. Go ahead and listen. Tell 
me when the voices you hear are all your own.

You can read more of Leonora Simonovis’ work in the print in the print edition of The Arkansas International 8.

Leonora Simonovis grew up in Caracas, Venezuela, and currently lives in San Diego. She is a professor of Spanish and Caribbean literature and culture at the University of San Diego and an MFA candidate in poetry at Antioch University, Los Angeles. Her work has appeared or is forthcoming in the Kenyon Review blog, Storyscape, Tifetet Journal, the Acentos Review, the American Journal of Poetry, The Rumpus, and Tinderbox Poetry Journal. Her chapbook manuscript, Waiting for a Ripe Mango, was a finalist for the Snowbound Tupelo Prize Award.