Rating: 0 out of 5 stars
0 ratings
Ebook222 pages59 minutes
Lotería: Nocturnal Sweepstakes
Rating: 0 out of 5 stars
()
About this ebook
The vision begins with a river. From this river, you can see a village, marine life, and ancestral rituals. It is here that you recognize origins, and a poison beginning to spread through paradise. Suddenly, a premonition: a wounded animal. The certainty of war cries. What you take with you is what you become, each movement a gamble, a lottery of life that transforms you until this moment, when uncertainty becomes an ally.
Lotería: Nocturnal Sweepstakes is a collection of deeply evocative coming-of-age poems that take the reader on a voyage through the intimate experiences of displacement. Conjuring dreamlike visions of extravagant fruits and rivers animated by the power of divination, these poems follow the speaker from the lash of war’s arrival through an urgent escape and reinvention in a land that saves with maternal instinct but also smothers its children.
In this bilingual collection, Colombian American poet Elizabeth Torres threads together the stories of family dynamics and the realities of migration with the archetypes of tarot and the traditional Lotería game, used for centuries as an object of divination and entertainment. Through these themes and images, the poems in Lotería narrate intimate moments in the lives and journeys of migrants, refugees, and all who have been forced into metamorphosis in order to reach the other side of the river.
Lotería: Nocturnal Sweepstakes is a collection of deeply evocative coming-of-age poems that take the reader on a voyage through the intimate experiences of displacement. Conjuring dreamlike visions of extravagant fruits and rivers animated by the power of divination, these poems follow the speaker from the lash of war’s arrival through an urgent escape and reinvention in a land that saves with maternal instinct but also smothers its children.
In this bilingual collection, Colombian American poet Elizabeth Torres threads together the stories of family dynamics and the realities of migration with the archetypes of tarot and the traditional Lotería game, used for centuries as an object of divination and entertainment. Through these themes and images, the poems in Lotería narrate intimate moments in the lives and journeys of migrants, refugees, and all who have been forced into metamorphosis in order to reach the other side of the river.
Related to Lotería
Related ebooks
Rus in Urbe Trace Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Larcenist (Volume 2, Issue #4) Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsVindication: poems from six women Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsEnchantment Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Voyage of Captain Popanilla Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Voyage of Popanilla Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsSailing the Forest: Selected Poems Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsCreatures Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsDeer Hoof on River Cobbles: Poems Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsSystem and Population Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsIsles of Firm Ground Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsHill of Doors Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Ruth of Many Names + Other Loose-Leaf Poems Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsInexhaustible Offering: Lincoln Park Mornings Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Coals of Fire Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Heronry Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Habitation of Wonder Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Voyage of Captain Popanilla Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsPainting with Words: Landscapes in Verse Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsSwithering Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5These Common Mornings, This Common Night Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsSanctuary: The Preservation Issue Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsArrow Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Dance Upon the Forest Floor Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsUntrussed: Poems Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsSo Far So Good Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Shape of a Forest Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Whale: In Search of the Giants of the Sea Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsRiver Notes: The Dance of Herons Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5
Poetry For You
Love Her Wild: Poems Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Iliad: The Fitzgerald Translation Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Odyssey: (The Stephen Mitchell Translation) Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Divine Comedy: Inferno, Purgatory, and Paradise Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5The Canterbury Tales Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Prophet Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Bedtime Stories for Grown-ups Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5For colored girls who have considered suicide/When the rainbow is enuf Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Dante's Divine Comedy: Inferno Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Iliad of Homer Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Tao Te Ching: A New English Version Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Inward Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Odyssey Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Dante's Inferno: The Divine Comedy, Book One Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Beowulf Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Selected Poems Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Divine Comedy: Inferno Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Way Forward Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Dream Work Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Leaves of Grass: 1855 Edition Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Daily Stoic: A Daily Journal On Meditation, Stoicism, Wisdom and Philosophy to Improve Your Life Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5The Complete Poems of Emily Dickinson (ReadOn Classics) Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Complete Poems of Emily Dickinson Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Twenty love poems and a song of despair Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Gilgamesh: A Verse Narrative Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Beyond Thoughts: An Exploration Of Who We Are Beyond Our Minds Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Gilgamesh: A New English Version Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Edgar Allan Poe: The Complete Collection Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Letters to a Young Poet (Rediscovered Books): With linked Table of Contents Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Complete Poems Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5
Related podcast episodes
Islands of Writers 0% found this document usefulIf Life is a Journey on Water… 0% found this document usefulMermaids and Sirens: Maritime Myths and Legends 0% found this document usefulMudlarking - 25 January 2021: Toi, toi, toi. 0% found this document usefulDo Your Words Make Music? Let's Look at Magnetic Meter 0% found this document usefulMudlarking (Rebroadcast) - 24 January 2022: What's the plural of octopus? 0% found this document usefulMyth | Remembrance & Initiation of the Soul 0% found this document usefulEp22 - Shadows From Before 0% found this document useful
Related articles
New Poetry by Indigenous Women Literary HubArticle
New Poetry by Indigenous Women
Aug 14, 2018
8 min readThe Island (catullus 64) The American Poetry ReviewArticle
The Island (catullus 64)
Mar 1, 2022
Back then the evergreens tumbled downriverfrom the glaze-white runoff to the boot-stirred puddlesof amber young men who fulfilled our destiny,who clambered into ships, on horses, and in wagonspainting the newfound landscapes ours.Our calling was nobl
9 min readPoetry of Place New Mexico MagazineArticle
Poetry of Place
May 30, 2023
9 min readSiren Song Orion MagazineArticle
Siren Song
Aug 27, 2021
10 min readLay Of The Land Orion MagazineArticle
Lay Of The Land
Aug 27, 2021
TARA K. SHEPERSKY YOU WOULDN’T know how to get down here without someone to point out the path. You wouldn’t know there was a public beach at all. From the road, signs are few. An eclectic scatter of homes, distorted wave-speak rumbling from thick ra
17 min readPoems To Celebrate Earth Day 2022, Selected By Independent Climate And Environment Writers The IndependentArticle
Poems To Celebrate Earth Day 2022, Selected By Independent Climate And Environment Writers
Apr 19, 2022
5 min readThe Boatman And The Bear Orion MagazineArticle
The Boatman And The Bear
May 27, 2022
9 min readTwo Poems The American Poetry ReviewArticle
Two Poems
Jul 1, 2020
I look to the tree line & already the leavesare ripping themselves away from their mothers. It is only August but I am already rising earlyfor a crisp moon, smoking in the rare chill of a shaded patio. My breasts have begun pickling,the fat rounds pr
2 min readNew Poetry by Queer Indigenous Women Literary HubArticle
New Poetry by Queer Indigenous Women
Apr 12, 2018
12 min readEarth Lines Bloom Magazine UKArticle
Earth Lines
Sep 1, 2022
4 min readTwo Poems The American Poetry ReviewArticle
Two Poems
May 1, 2020
Your body becomes dangerousin water, after you watch Memoirs of a Geisha & learn aboutthe eel & the cave, knowing it’s a metaphor for sex but alsotaking it literally, imagining what animal mightswim up into you as you wade, nakedin the lake under a c
1 min readFive Poems The American Poetry ReviewArticle
Five Poems
Jan 1, 2022
The painting is of a door, its wood so warpedwith moisture it cannot close. It stays ajar leaving a sliver of light—enough to suggestsomething sweet and almost unreachable behind the door—and you sit in yourroom working on the bills or those comforti
4 min readEvaporative Losses C MagazineArticle
Evaporative Losses
Sep 15, 2020
Breath travels. Our mouths are broken-open places—a house where only wind lives, searching the cupboards and closets. I replace your missing mouths with those of jars, mines, graves. What is gathered and dissipated by mouth? Once alternately filled a
4 min readRiver Orion MagazineArticle
River
Nov 27, 2023
The McKenzie River’s half in shade, half molten silverand today, in the shallow water,a single salmon, has made it back to whereshe began, her scintillant body that moves like a riverwithin the river, undulant, greenish and roseate.Then she flips on
1 min readWhere They Sing To The River: Sierra Nevada, The Heart Of The World Literary HubArticle
Where They Sing To The River: Sierra Nevada, The Heart Of The World
Apr 15, 2020
6 min readA Watery Graveyard Revisited Yachting MonthlyArticle
A Watery Graveyard Revisited
Apr 27, 2023
2 min readThis Is Not a Defense of Poetry Literary HubArticle
This Is Not a Defense of Poetry
Mar 30, 2017
The following remarks were originally delivered at the the Oslo Poesifestival 2016. A defense of poetry is a contradiction in terms. The honor to speak this evening, which I accept with great humility, though inevitably unnerving, I will use to cont
12 min readSmall Wonder: The Challenge of Parenting Through Climate Collapse Literary HubArticle
Small Wonder: The Challenge of Parenting Through Climate Collapse
Nov 18, 2019
8 min readStarshift Guernica MagazineArticle
Starshift
Sep 9, 2019
16 min readRed Tide Warning The American ScholarArticle
Red Tide Warning
Mar 4, 2024
16 min readTime And Tide Wait For No Avocet Country LifeArticle
Time And Tide Wait For No Avocet
Nov 22, 2023
4 min readThere Be Dragons. In This Essay. Literary HubArticle
There Be Dragons. In This Essay.
Jul 20, 2020
10 min readIn Memory Of Derek Alton Walcott The Paris ReviewArticle
In Memory Of Derek Alton Walcott
Mar 15, 2018
1 Island traffic slows to a haltas screeching gulls reluctantto lift heavenwardcongregate like mourners in saltcrustedkelp, as the repellentnews spreads to colder shores: Sir Derek is no more.Bandwidths, clogged by streamingtributes, carry the pitcho
2 min readCicadas Still Sing Orion MagazineArticle
Cicadas Still Sing
Jun 3, 2021
IN LATE JUNE, the thrum of annual cicadas, or chicharras, as we call them here in San Antonio, becomes the dominant sound of summer. The air percolates with percussion as males buckle their ribs to make mating calls. If a female likes a male’s drummi
3 min readNo Trick of Light High Country NewsArticle
No Trick of Light
May 1, 2020
It’s just out of reach, the source of this memory: An image from a film on a loop, flickering like the California Dream itself. A critical scene shift. An establishing shot locates us in a sleek, dim bedroom: Drapes, pulled apart, allow a streak of c
20 min readThe Color of the River Is Light High Country NewsArticle
The Color of the River Is Light
Apr 1, 2024
7 min readThe Tidal Man Popshot MagazineArticle
The Tidal Man
May 3, 2018
3 min readLake Michigan Thinks It’s Still an Ocean Literary HubArticle
Lake Michigan Thinks It’s Still an Ocean
Aug 28, 2020
5 min readThe Whale Who Will Come Soon NautilusArticle
The Whale Who Will Come Soon
Sep 8, 2021
The beachfront narrows to an ocherous ribbon, belted by blue, above and below. After a while, a handful of shearwaters appear in the air above the Cat Balou. The birds flash around us; like knife-thrower tricks at a circus. Diving through the water,
8 min readIn the Face of Implacable Landscapes, Natural and Viral Literary HubArticle
In the Face of Implacable Landscapes, Natural and Viral
Apr 9, 2020
7 min read
Related categories
Reviews for Lotería
Rating: 0 out of 5 stars
0 ratings
0 ratings0 reviews
Book preview
Lotería - Elizabeth Torres
Cover Page for Lotería
Lotería
Sorteo Nocturno
The Lottery
Nocturnal Sweepstakes
Winner of the 2022 Ambroggio Prize of the Academy of American Poets
Selected by Raina J. León
Sponsored by the Academy of American Poets, the Ambroggio Prize is given annually to the winner of an open competition among American poets whose primary language is Spanish.
Lotería
Sorteo Nocturno
The Lottery
Nocturnal Sweepstakes
Elizabeth Torres
University of Arizona Press, TucsonThe University of Arizona Press
www.uapress.arizona.edu
We respectfully acknowledge the University of Arizona is on the land and territories of Indigenous peoples. Today, Arizona is home to twenty-two federally recognized tribes, with Tucson being home to the O’odham and the Yaqui. Committed to diversity and inclusion, the University strives to build sustainable relationships with sovereign Native Nations and Indigenous communities through education offerings, partnerships, and community service.
© 2023 by Elizabeth Torres
All rights reserved. Published 2023
ISBN-13: 978-0-8165-4960-3 (paperback)
ISBN-13: 978-0-8165-4961-0 (ebook)
Cover design by Leigh McDonald
Cover illustrations via rawpixel
Illustrations and translations by Elizabeth Torres
Designed and typeset by Leigh McDonald in Bell MT 10.25/13 and Mightype (display)
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Names: Torres, Elizabeth, 1987– author. | Torres, Elizabeth, 1987– Lotería. | Torres, Elizabeth, 1987– Lotería. English.
Title: Lotería : sorteo nocturno = The lottery : nocturnal sweepstakes / Elizabeth Torres.
Other titles: Lottery
Description: Tucson : The University of Arizona Press, 2023. | Spanish and parallel English.
Identifiers: LCCN 2022030109 (print) | LCCN 2022030110 (ebook) | ISBN 9780816549603 (paperback) | ISBN 9780816549610 (ebook)
Subjects: LCSH: Lotería (Game)—Poetry. | Tarot—Poetry. | LCGFT: Poetry.
Classification: LCC PQ8180.43.O75 L6813 2023 (print) | LCC PQ8180.43.O75 (ebook) | DDC 861/.7—dc23/eng/20220819
LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2022030109
LC ebook record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2022030110
Printed in the United States of America
♾ This paper meets the requirements of ANSI/NISO Z39.48-1992 (Permanence of Paper).
Contents
El presagio / The Omen
El floripondio / The Floripondio
El gallo / The Rooster
La casa / The House
La granadilla / The Granadilla
El diablito / The Devil
La niña / The Child
El miedo / The Fear
La obra / The Play
El péndulo / The Pendulum
La violencia / The Violence
El avión / The Airplane
La especie / The Species
El viaje / The Voyage
El estado de las cosas / State of Affairs
El diagnóstico / The Diagnosis
El kilómetro / The Kilometer
La aduana / The Customs Office
La leche / The Milk
El recién llegado / The Newcomer
La muralla / The Wall
El préstamo / The Loan
El inventario / The Inventory
El paraíso / Paradise
El sorteo nocturno / Nocturnal Sweepstakes
La luna / The Moon
El panorama / The Outlook
El árbol / The Tree
El agua / Water
La lluvia / The Rain
Los constructores / The Builders
La herencia / The Inheritance
El pájaro / The Bird
La corona / The Crown
La incongruencia / The Incongruence
La calavera / The Calavera
El corresponsal de guerra / The War Correspondent
La escalera / The Ladder
La mosca / The Fly
La familia / The Family
La nación / The Motherland
La mano / The Hand
Los distintos espantos / Different Ghosts
La muerte / Death
Los cuervos / The Crows
El tambor / The Drum
La ciudad / The City
La estrella / The Star
El Xólotl / The Xolotl
La lotería / The Lottery
Lotería
Sorteo Nocturno
The Lottery
Nocturnal Sweepstakes
El presagio
Aquí antes pasaba un río.
En las mañanas, las mujeres del pueblo traían telares y cantaban,
mientras desnudas dejaban que el sol y el viento las acariciaran.
En las tardes al salir de la escuela, los niños traían sus barcos de papel
o hacían ranitas de las piedras.
A esa hora, el río parecía más alegre,
más brusco, más inquieto . . .
y si los niños no llegaban, sus aguas subían con rabia
y se desbordaban hasta alcanzarlos en sus casas.
En las noches, los guerreros pasaban de dos en dos,
con sus armas y maletas elevadas en sus brazos
y sus botas y uniformes helados por el agua.
Eran otra clase de caricias las que devolvía el viento a esas horas.
Como susurrándoles el olor del cuerpo de sus amadas,
que hacía varios meses habían abrazado a orillas de otros ríos,
con discursos revolucionarios y sin flores.
Pero era también una caricia fría,
la del presentimiento,
apenas trazando olvidos en sus cuerpos mientras cruzaban el río:
los ojos bien abiertos,
la piel pálida,
la muerte husmeando su llegada.
Aquí antes pasaba un río casi transparente,
sus especies marinas tan asombrosas
que de vez en cuando llegaban de ciudades lejanas a estudiarles.
Cuando llovía, una de mis aventuras favoritas era desnudarme
y entregarme a su embrujo, con los ojos cerrados,
imaginando que cada una de mis partículas
dejaba de ser esta figura constante y su sombra,
ambas desvaneciéndose hasta convertirse también en oleada.
El vaivén era ritual ancestral para mí,
una meditación que mi abuela y mi
Enjoying the preview?
Page 1 of 1