1.7
translation by Shannon Barnes
the end of the street seems
a small suburb, a misplaced
community refusing to fade
skillfully clinging to
postmodernism. but it’s actually
a street with no exit
with an abandoned McDonald’s
covered in graffiti and posters
now a place for punks and
rodents of all kinds to hang.
the end of the street
makes more sense than the rest of
the city. sometimes the only remaining
light post comes on and
flickers, and is all the logistics
needed to keep the street
from fading into nothing.
Jonatan María Reyes is from Santurce, Puerto Rico, author of Perdíamos la gracia y el verano (Fedora editores, 2016), Data de otro ardor (Verbum, Spain, 2018), Databending (Barnacle, Argentina 2019) and Lo común también cruje (La Impresora, Puerto Rico, 2020 / Herring Publishers, Mexico, 2020). In 2018, he received the XI International Poetry Prize “Gastón Baquero”, and in 2021 was named an inaugural Letras Boricuas Fellow by Flamboyan Foundation. He is a finalist for various poetry awards. Some of his texts have been translated into Italian, Greek, English, French and Portuguese. He also writes screenplays and edited the poetry magazine Low fi ardentía.
Shannon Barnes is a translator and Spanish Instructor from Hamilton, Ohio. She is the translator of a series of poems written by Puerto Rican poet Jonatan María Reyes. Shannon earned her M.A. in Spanish and a Graduate Certificate in Translation and Interpretation from the University of Louisville. She also received her B.A. in Spanish from Miami University, where she is currently employed. While Shannon is not teaching or translating, she enjoys spending her time outdoors