Ballad for the One Who Never Went to Iowa

By JULIÁN DAVID BAÑUELOS

After Rafael Alberti 

I noticed the canas sprouting from her scalp, I noticed the sky,
I noticed the engines hum, I noticed my heartbeat, and the breeze.
Nunca fui a Iowa.

My mother tells me I gave her canas, and now I have my own.
Mi bisabuela worked los campos, says she was once Iowan 
Nunca vi Iowa.

I noticed the hills, the people populating small towns, roadkill—
I noticed county lines, I noticed the tumbleweeds, the flat lands
Nunca entré en Iowa.

I left to find the fields, the tomatoes, the beets, and the music
Mi bisabuelo worked for the railroad, and now I follow tracks
Nunca fui a Iowa.

I noticed the early risers, I noticed the big trucks, the high-
ways, I noticed the canyon, I noticed the solid yellow lines
Nunca vi Iowa.

Both my bisabuelos are gone, I am lucky to have known pain,
Here, I am lucky to have found the cardinal perching on the dogwood 
Nunca entré en Iowa.

I noticed the music fade, I noticed the blur in the rear view,
Again, I noticed the sky, the sun, the drift of clouds in pursuit 
Nunca fui a Iowa.

I am where the music died, came from where it began, I noticed
blood in the horizon, I noticed the river, I wanted to swim. 
Nunca vi Iowa.

 

Julián David Bañuelos is a Mexican American poet and translator from Lubbock, Texas. He is a graduate of the Iowa Writers’ Workshop. You can find his work at JulianDavidBanuelos.com.

[Purchase Issue 26 here.] 

Ballad for the One Who Never Went to Iowa

Related Posts

November 2024 Poetry Feature: New Work from our Contributors

G. C. WALDREP
I am listening to the slickened sound of the new / wind. It is a true thing. Or, it is true in its falseness. / It is the stuff against which matter’s music breaks. / Mural of the natural, a complicity epic. / The shoals, not quite distant enough to unhear— / Not at all like a war. Or, like a war, in passage, / a friction of consequence.

Caroline M. Mar Headshot

Waters of Reclamation: Raychelle Heath Interviews Caroline M. Mar

CAROLINE M. MAR
That's a reconciliation that I'm often grappling with, which is about positionality. What am I responsible for? What's coming up for me; who am I in all of this? How can I be my authentic self and also how do I maybe take some responsibility?

October 2024 Poetry Feature: New Poems By Our Contributors

NATHANIEL PERRY
Words can contain their opposite, / pleasure at once a freedom and a ploy— / a garden something bound and original / where anything, but certain things, should thrive; / the difference between loving-kindness and loving / like the vowel shift from olive to alive.