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| Rosa 'Winchester Cathedral' 17 August 2025 |
Everything that surrounds me in my little Kitsilano home reminds me of Rosemary. If it doesn’t, I find a way of connecting her. Today my sparse rose garden had one unusual bloom. It is the English Rose, Rosa ‘Winchester Cathedral’ which is a white rose. But sometimes, and most rarely it will feature a little reddish dot. The surprise to me defines my Rosemary. While I lived with her for 52 years, every day she would do something I could not predict and it would delight me.
Alfonsina Storni was a Swiss born Argentine poet who walked into the sea and drowned in 1938 a couple of days after she sent her last poem to a Buenos Aires newspaper telling them to advise that should her son call, she would be gone. Because we live in an Anglocentric corner of the world nobody seems to know anything about this terrific proto feminist poet.
On a trip to Buenos Aires a year after Rosemary died I made the mistake of staying in our usual hotel. I sat on a wing chair in front of the elevator almost hoping the door would open and she would walk out. I was reading a book of Storni's romantic poems and found myself falling in love with Rosemary all over again.
Tú Me Quieres Blanca - Alfonsina Storni (the poem in English below)
Tú me quieres alba,
Me quieres de espumas,
Me quieres de nácar.
Que sea azucena
Sobre todas, casta.
De perfume tenue.
Corola cerrada
Ni un rayo de luna
Filtrado me haya.
Ni una margarita
Se diga mi hermana.
Tú me quieres nívea,
Tú me quieres blanca,
Tú me quieres alba.
Tú que hubiste todas
Las copas a mano,
De frutos y mieles
Los labios morados.
Tú que en el banquete
Cubierto de pámpanos
Dejaste las carnes
Festejando a Baco.
Tú que en los jardines
Negros del Engaño
Vestido de rojo
Corriste al Estrago.
Tú que el esqueleto
Conservas intacto
No sé todavía
Por cuáles milagros,
Me pretendes blanca
(Dios te lo perdone),
Me pretendes casta
(Dios te lo perdone),
¡Me pretendes alba!
Huye hacia los bosques,
Vete a la montaña;
Límpiate la boca;
Vive en las cabañas;
Toca con las manos
La tierra mojada;
Alimenta el cuerpo
Con raíz amarga;
Bebe de las rocas;
Duerme sobre escarcha;
Renueva tejidos
Con salitre y agua;
Habla con los pájaros
Y lévate al alba.
Y cuando las carnes
Te sean tornadas,
Y cuando hayas puesto
En ellas el alma
Que por las alcobas
Se quedó enredada,
Entonces, buen hombre,
Preténdeme blanca,
Preténdeme nívea,
Preténdeme casta.
