Maria Castro Dominguez – What You Take With You

P Maria Dominguez LE P&W Vol 2 2019

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Poems by Maria Castro Dominguez

Maria Castro Dominguez is the author of ‘A Face in The Crowd’ which is her 2016 Erbacce Press prize winning collection. Winner of the third prize in Brittle Star´s Poetry Competition 2018 and finalist in the 2019 Stephen A DiBiase Poetry contest NY and Mslexia Max Poetry Competition. Joint winner of the Orbis 185 Readers’ Award 2019. She has flash fiction and poems published in literary journals and anthologies such as:  Obsessed With Pipework, SarvastiApogee, The Long-Islander Huntington Journal, StepAway, London Grip, Popshot Magazine and Fly on the Wall Press’anthology ‘The Weird and Wonderful’ edited by Isabelle Kenyon. Born and raised in London; she holds a Bachelor’s degree in English philology and works as a freelance writer, proof reader and language teacher.


What You Take With You

When you move to a foreign country you take:
Your soul with holes so new life seeps in.
Hidden scars that prove who you are.
Eyes, a child’s again. Photographs
like pixelated shadows.
Those who stayed. The books you gave.
Seeds to plant to keep your blood neat.
Your imagination translated into
vowels that glow in your mouth.
Unanswered prayers. Letters needing a reply.
A mind racing ahead, a body catching breath.
Saffron summers. Cooking by instinct.
A particular way of making any space your place
and you take, the infinite island which is yourself.


To Friends

Last night when we met
it was raining,
two friends drifting,
wind beating the palm tree heads
to a modern requiem.
You spoke about your in-laws
without letting me drop in a word,
how they cared, yet disturbed you.
All I heard was the burden
of our fragility.


© Maria Castro Dominguez