Elena Knows

by Claudia Piñeiro

Elena never understood why people chose caskets made of noble hardwoods that would take a long time to break down. If so many people believe that we are all of dust and to dust must turn again, why delay the return. They pick fancy caskets just to show off, she thinks, why would they do it otherwise, if they know neither the coffin nor what’s inside it are destined to last but to rot, to be eaten by worms, both the wood and that body that no longer holds the person it was, a body that no longer belongs to anyone, like an empty bag, incomplete, a pod without seeds.

Elena is not astray. Elena knows. She waits. With her bowed head and her shuffling feet, without seeing the road or what it will bring. She doesn’t go astray, even if she sometimes wanders.

Appropriating the word of God is the greatest act of arrogance, Father, pure arrogance.

Rita’s tears fell upward, from the tear duct along the curve of her eyelids, tracing the arch of her brows before racing over her forehead and disappearing into her hairline.

Rita always got angry with people who spoke quietly. I don’t trust them, Mum.

Elena walked out onto Ramsay street crying, when she got into Roberto Almada’s car he asked her, What’s wrong Elena, why are you crying? They treated me kindly, son, she said, and couldn’t say anything more.

Never isn’t a word that applies to our species, there are so many things that we think we’d never do and yet, when put in the situation, we do them.

People confuse thinking with knowing, they let themselves confuse the two.

you only know something once you’ve experienced it in your life, life is our greatest test.