BREAKUP; DAYBREAK
by Laura Cesarco Eglin
Parting with you is leaving
the butter outside the fridge
resting on the dish. The
blade of the knife persistent
as it rests beside the rigid block.
The same kind of light
yellow marks the beginning of
the day. As I go about without
you. Only in my mind—
knowing that I forgot
the butter, knowing nothing will
happen other than a softening of
the edges, and the sun
will merge into the sky. The rays
diffusing the blade of your absence.
About the author
Laura Cesarco Eglin is a poet and translator from Uruguay. She is the author of six collections of poetry, including the chapbooks Between Gone and Leaving—Home (dancing girl press, 2023) and Time/Tempo: The Idea of Breath (PRESS 254, 2022). Her poems and translations (from the Spanish, Portuguese, Portuñol, and Galician), have appeared in many journals such as Asymptote, Figure 1, Eleven Eleven, Puerto del Sol, Copper Nickel, SRPR, Arsenic Lobster, International Poetry Review, Tupelo Quarterly, Columbia Poetry Review, Timber, and more. Cesarco Eglin is the translator of Claus and the Scorpion by the Galician author Lara Dopazo Ruibal (co•im•press, 2022), longlisted for both the 2023 PEN Award in Poetry in Translation and the 2023 National Translation Award in Poetry. She is also the translator of Of Death. Minimal Odes by the Brazilian author Hilda Hilst (co•im•press), which was the winner of the 2019 Best Translated Book Award. Cesarco Eglin is the publisher of Veliz Books and teaches creative writing at the University of Houston-Downtown. More at lauracesarcoeglin.com