Temporada de invierno/ Winter Season
Updated: Oct 25
By: Carolina Esses
Translated from the Spanish by Allison A. deFreese
The Mountain Fit in the Palm
of my hand. She only needed a name.
Through her, we should each follow our desires
our nature, my father corrected.
He, who has never seen snow, walks ahead.
It’s summer.
That luster between the stones
could be snow.
Writer and journalist Carolina Esses (Buenos Aires, Argentina) has has published several books of poems,
including Versiones del paraíso/Variations on Paradise (Del Dock, 2016) and Temporada de invierno/Winter Season (Bajo la luna, 2009, translation by Allison A. deFreese forthcoming by Entre Ríos Books, Seattle, in late 2023). Her poems have previously been translated into French and have appeared in the anthology Poésie récente d’Argentine, une anthologie possible/Recent Poetry from Argentina: a Possible Anthology, published by Editorial Reflet de Lettres. A literary critic for La Nación, Argentina’s leading daily paper, she is
also the author of several novels.
Translator’s Bio: Poet and literary translator Allison A. deFreese (she/her/ella) is based in the Pacific Northwest. Her translations of Carolina Esses’s previous work appear in Bellingham Review, Clackamas Literary Review, Eunoia Review, Mantis, and Rain Magazine. Allison’s recent literary translations include Karla Marrufo’s Flame Trees in May (Dalkey Archive Press and Deep Vellum Books, 2023). She is author of The Night With James Dean and Other Prose Poems (Cathexis Northwest Press, 2022).