Who Was I? Poem by Svetlana Cârstean

I was a lonely little boy whose hair they braided into pigtails one day and placed blue bows and an elastic headband.

His ears were red and painful from the too-tight elastic squeezing his head and from the punishments given him by his father. He'd rub the boy's ears between his thumb and forefinger the way you'd rub a dry leaf of mint or basil or a rose petal to crush it into a powder so you could keep it in a small, brown paper bag. The boy's ears burned and glowed red like two rose petals, and the boy could hear very acutely, better and better, the faraway sounds. His hearing has become a tunnel in which sounds and pain become one and roll down like heavy lead balls.

I was a little boy who one day began to grow breasts.
And today the little boy has to write a composition. His hands, smelling of play- doh, have large ink stains along the delicate bones covered in a transparent skin; his soul shrinks more and more, until it's the size of a poppy seed, that then rolls slowly to the teacher's feet unconsciously beating a rhythm in the unknown darkness under the desk. There it begs for mercy. Calls for help.

I cannot write this composition. Nonetheless I can give you news: since this morning, my breasts have been growing.



Translation from Romanian by Claudia Serea