Valerie Wallace
Hemingway joined me at the top of the Spanish El Morro
I was memorizing the Habana skyline. It would rain that afternoon though now my skirt
was wrapped under my legs and the granite was warm and rough underneath and the air
was bright as tin. From here you could not see the little dogs in the street or the green
short skirts of the women or the men thanking God for them or the red shirts and blue
sheets hanging over the balconies or old women smoking cigars. You could see the
harbor. My God! The harbor with its decrepit ships and virgin built by the freed slaves.
The virgin overlooking the harbor, you could see that. Artists were walking around to
look at the installations at El Morro. One installation was two hundred human feet
hanging in nylons from the ceiling. The feet were wax of course. There were canons still
there from the Spanish, facing the harbor and the skyline beyond that. I looked at the
skyline and wondered about how the wicked things start from an innocence. The skyline
of Habana rose across the harbor in a long stack of columns and doorways, adding to
itself and taking away, rising in walls and arches and the fading dome of the former
capital.
“Will everything be all right?” asked the American girl.
“Of course it will, if that’s what you want.” He rubbed the girl’s shoulder in circles with
one hand as he leaned against the wall. The sun was climbing down. It was climbing
down toward them.
Valerie Wallace’s work was selected by Margaret Atwood for the 2012 Atty Award, and has been supported most recently by the Illinois Arts Council, Ragdale Foundation, Midwest Writers Center, San Miguel de Allende Writers Conference, Vermont Studio Center, and Barbara Deming Fund for Women. She teaches workshops and classes in Chicago and is an editor with RHINO and advisory board member for the Afghan Women's Writing Project. Her chapbook The Dictators’ Guide to Good Housekeeping is available fromdancinggirlpress.
Return to September 2014 Edition
I was memorizing the Habana skyline. It would rain that afternoon though now my skirt
was wrapped under my legs and the granite was warm and rough underneath and the air
was bright as tin. From here you could not see the little dogs in the street or the green
short skirts of the women or the men thanking God for them or the red shirts and blue
sheets hanging over the balconies or old women smoking cigars. You could see the
harbor. My God! The harbor with its decrepit ships and virgin built by the freed slaves.
The virgin overlooking the harbor, you could see that. Artists were walking around to
look at the installations at El Morro. One installation was two hundred human feet
hanging in nylons from the ceiling. The feet were wax of course. There were canons still
there from the Spanish, facing the harbor and the skyline beyond that. I looked at the
skyline and wondered about how the wicked things start from an innocence. The skyline
of Habana rose across the harbor in a long stack of columns and doorways, adding to
itself and taking away, rising in walls and arches and the fading dome of the former
capital.
“Will everything be all right?” asked the American girl.
“Of course it will, if that’s what you want.” He rubbed the girl’s shoulder in circles with
one hand as he leaned against the wall. The sun was climbing down. It was climbing
down toward them.
Valerie Wallace’s work was selected by Margaret Atwood for the 2012 Atty Award, and has been supported most recently by the Illinois Arts Council, Ragdale Foundation, Midwest Writers Center, San Miguel de Allende Writers Conference, Vermont Studio Center, and Barbara Deming Fund for Women. She teaches workshops and classes in Chicago and is an editor with RHINO and advisory board member for the Afghan Women's Writing Project. Her chapbook The Dictators’ Guide to Good Housekeeping is available fromdancinggirlpress.
Return to September 2014 Edition