I find myself often dancing with words in the liminal space between borders. As a performance poet, I memorize my poems, dress up and act them out theatrically. I have performed bilingual poems to a mostly English speaking audience, performed poetry in galleries and community centers, created events with artists, musicians, and healers as well as poets. And my favorite project: an art installation developed from writing workshops for youth in crisis, some of them homeless, some of them with broken homes where they have been abused, some of them with chemical dependencies and probation officers, some of them teen parents. The teens built the structure to house the CD recording of their writings and other teens made collages out of the photos they took of places where they feel they belong or feel safe. The structure, based on the concept of the Jewish sukkah, was covered in tie dyed cloth art students had made. In the Shelter of Words was installed at the school, at an art gallery, at an event for awareness of youth and homelessness, and at Mid-town Global Market, a multi-cultural market place. A space where the public could intersect with their daily world.

I have danced in the space between worlds when my dear ones have passed to the other side, the space where words can only be translations of profound grief, awkward at times, soaring with beauty at others, where words connected me to the hearts of my audience, where words catch a glimpse of what is inexpressible.

And now I dance in the space between sending back the galleys and having the book in my hands. Dar la luz, the Latinos say, to give or bring to light. Birth is a bringing to Light. My previous book Ceremonies of the Spirit was a very personal collection of love poems that traveled a spiral from infatuation to consecration. This chapbook transparencies of light is a mosaic of women's voices, from Native American, from the Middle East, mothers who have lost children, single mothers, wise women struggling with hormones and the desire to be young and sexy again. These poems poured forth from my experiences of living in New Mexico and Israel and wanting to be a conduit, a voice for women who may not have one.

I loved performing poems from Ceremonies. It was a blast to dress up in lace and perform "I don't want to be your Angel any more...I want to be a tease, a flirt, a run for your money." Or the poem flavored by Runi: "Oh my friends, I am mad with love and no one sees how sweetly I am harnessed to this yoke." Or to drape a veil over my face as I finished with: "To stand in the place where I am both mirror and veil."

But to dance with the sorrow of women in the midst of war and revolt, to be the teen choosing a week-end in New York City instead of a prom, to be in your face as a hooker determined to hold onto her belief that her pimp loves her, to be a single mom on her knees with fear for her son, how will I become these women on stage? To be authentic to their voices, their destinies, their joys?

I love a challenge. Birthing my book is another type of revelation. Not of my self but our selves. Our feminine selves, full of love and fear, rage and celebration, humility and strength, and the stories we tell about our lives that connect us to each other and to the world. I will listen as their voices come through me on stage just as I listened for their stories to come through me onto the page.