How could I have known
that I would already be so famous,
paraded at parties and official banquets,
where elegant ladies constantly ask me
to write original poems
on their fancy silk fans?
Sonnets about their beauty—
I imagine that’s what they expect,
and sometimes it’s the sort of verse
I’m able to produce on short notice,
but there are other days
when all I want to say
is la verdad—the truth,
serving as history’s
honest witness.