One Day I Will Save Myself

Poems in English and Spanish

Elvira Sastre

• Publisher: Atria Books
• Year: 2019
• ISBN:
  9781982117894
• Topic: Literature
• Subtopic: Women in Poetry
• Index: Literature

The debut US poetry collection from social media star Elvira Sastre, exploring the sharp, slippery moments that turn a beloved relationship into something self-destructive. Counting the days that pass after a devastating breakup, Elvira Sastre confronts the haunting questions that surround every failed relationship: What happened? Where did it all go wrong? How did it all fall apart? With a bold, lyrical voice poised on the knife's edge of romance and grief, Sastre evokes the heady rush of first love and the sorrow of its painful end—even as she learns to pick up the pieces and move on after the worst has happened. At once deeply personal and universally resonant, painful and resoundingly hopeful, One Day I Will Save Myself speaks to the poet in all of us. An intimate journey through loving, losing, and living that inspires readers to begin their own healing and is perfect for fans of Rupi Kaur, r.h. Sin, and Atticus.

Double or Nothing

We are all in love.

Except that some of us are awake.

Love is an open parenthesis.

—Do you love me?

—More than my own life, said the suicidal one.

I knew that I still loved her

because I hated her with an amazing brutality.

I knew that I no longer loved her

because the hatred disappeared.

Double or nothing.

I know that you make me happy

because my sadness doesn’t recognize you.

She was so pretty that she made me reflect:

Was I going to love her on the outside

or love myself from within?

I loved her with the eternity granted

by the brevity of an unforgettable moment.

When you got up the courage to read me

I was already in another book.

We spent so much time together

that we thought that we weren’t doing anything else.

We were wrong.

We were doing everything.

She asked me to write her

a love poem.

I sketched a bird,

and she went away.

There’s no worse way to forget yourself

than to not recognize yourself.

You’re a fallen angel,

but taught me to fly

and that’s reason enough

for you to rise up once again.

I tend to make peace with my world

when I see someone talking alone

out loud: one less case of solitude.

I’m just as weak and just as strong

as a flower in the middle of a field of ruins.

I share my solitude with my back:

that’s why I’m always in constant

flight: I only hug myself.

The circles under my eyes are overflowing with dreams

ever since you kisse...