Lajes in the '90s

Lajes in the '90s

1992

I entered the heavy dark of the airfield
and onto a bus, its strange tongue
hovering in the speech of men above me.

At seven I was a military brat
shrunk to the size of a seed without knowing
its future structure or how it might grow.

1993

The unending sand from my Nikes formed
hills of liberated beach in front of my house.

Some nation grew there among neighborhood
children and we tried to find ways to populate it

with hedgehogs and canaries
yet they would never stay alive.

1994

When we moved to live on base,
Poochers—our adopted stray—ran after the car,
so Dad took her with us. She saw diminish

from the windshield her city but could
never adapt to the structure of fences
and so was put to sleep.

1995

The way the wind pushed us fast with our
jackets open like sails over our roller-skates;

the way we couldn't see it but felt it through
our child bodies, its force a simple game.

1996

At the end I witnessed an abrupt and
violent hail before the start of school.
We formed ice balls and threw them

at each other as a way to imagine
vaguely the act of war. Soon after,
ears stung red, we all left.

 

This is a homophonic translation of the section titled "Lajes and the 1990s" from "A Short History of Lajes Field, Terceira Island, Azores, Portugal," published by the 65th Air Base Wing History Office. The section was translated five different times to represent the five years of the author's time on the island.