Yuyariy

"The Andean condor soars," flyingfabi CC, Cañón del Colca, Peru, December 2020

Coffee & tumbao to greet
the morning. Conga & trombone to gather
steam. Campana & timbal to whittle
down the cerebral buzz
with sticks that tap
into an overwhelming breadth
& compress a 500-year-old history
of gold-eating
men into a single bite
size invocation that erupts
into trumpets
that push my gaze
not beyond the Basque & the Spanish
& yet bask
in the height of Huayna
Picchu

where I squint
at the absurd nine foot
wingspan of a bird that can fly
upwards of five hours without so much as a flap
of its black wings
& my ancestors
grasped the vastness of God in the condor —
how its immeasurable flight
could widen eyes
to the height & depth & breadth
of the cosmos.
Just imagine if my opposing forefathers
had seen. Imagine if you could read
this poem
in Quechua.

Alfonso Sito Sasieta is a mixed, white-adjacent Peruvian-American poet and dancer. Sito works in a L’Arche community and performs with the acclaimed Cuban dance company, DC Casineros.

Issue 70

This article first appeared in Geez magazine Issue 70, Fall 2023, Ancestors, Remembering for the Future.

Like this article? Subscribe to Geez and get more like this delivered to your door, ad-free, four times year.

View comments, or leave one yourself

Hide comments

(No one has dared comment yet.)

Start the Discussion

Please use Textile formatting. e.g. _geez_ → geez, *magazine* → magazine.
URLs will be linked automatically.

Get Our Newsletter

(Tasteful and spam-free, guaranteed.)

All content is © 2005–2024 Geez Magazine and its respective authors.   (Ascend)

Geez Magazine | 1950 Trumbull Ave. | Detroit, MI, USA | 48216