Patricia Matuk

*(Peru). I was born on St. Nicholas day with its resonances of childhood and gift. But my country was Lima and not Peru with its Arequipa from where my parents, also children of immigrants, came from. With that legacy of being doubly foreign, La Horrible never precipitated me to flee the country. And despite having traveled through various parts of my beloved Peru, I was forced to emigrate like so many others. I carried under my arm the English chewing and the odd literary prize in my suitcase, among which the Javier Heraud poetry prize with the 1st prize at the PUCP (1981) for Sobre-Viviendo Perdi-Dos, and the 1st prize for short stories Magda Portal (1994) for Soy Transparente Como Una Santa (I’m Transparent Like a Saint), also organized in Lima by Flora Tristán, at international level.

I have never stopped writing, but necessity led me to work as a journalist for Radio France International (now RTVF French Radio Television) for 15 years, where among other personalities, I had the good fortune to interview some important Peruvian poets, before having a space for Latin music and another for French music. I’ve been living in the countryside for a year now and I can say that the Pandemic pushed me out of the Parisian burden.

BLUE  FLOWER

my lover is a blue flower

cause it’s heaven and rest

a little sleepy ballad

ready to venture out of his lips

a step in front of the sea

my lover is a distant landscape

and maps to decipher

petals tattooed on him

my blue flower lover

has of night and of dune

of blue north ice

a moon’s soft hammock

when I arrive tired

by the dead’s tide

my lover surfs instantly

to heal my wounds

of imperative essence

born of the autumn tree wood

with which he makes

his most beautiful drum

in the mouth of the heart

I engraved five kisses

the tasty fruit of dawn

my lover lives with me

because it’s blue and fragrance

and a flower and a male

the stars are embellished

when my heart glows in it

© Patricia Matuk