Summer solstice, my birthday 

Today the sun stands like a giant 

beacon in the center of the sky—it 

doesn’t walk, it doesn’t bend, it 

simply is: the heart of all that breathes. 

I was born in that instant 

when its light becomes taut and 

ready to unleash the longest day 

like an unwrapped gift. 

My body is a field of wheat 

germinating in the warmth of its gaze, 

each hair a stalk seeking the blue fire of the sky. 

I am not just another day among days: 

I am the whisper of the sun when it realizes 

it has arrived home, the space 

where time stops to take a sip of solar honey. 

The air fills with tiny shadows, like 

letters in a letter the sun writes to the earth—

and I am the last word,

the one not read but felt on the skin, 

like a warm kiss that doesn’t fade. 

My lungs are windows open to the light, 

each breath a thread harvesting the entire day, 

weaving it into the fabric of my being. 

Today the world doesn’t revolve around the sun: 

it revolves around this instant in which 

I am the point where the sun meets itself, 

where summer becomes a heartbeat, 

where birth is the reflection of all that shines. 

December 21st, my birthday

GRACIELA NOEMI VILLAVERDE is a writer and poet from Concepción del Uruguay (Entre Rios) Argentina, based in Buenos Aires She graduated in letters and is the author of seven books of poetry, awarded several times worldwide. She works as the World Manager of Educational and Social Projects of the Hispanic World Union of Writers and is the UHE World Honorary President of the same institution’s Activa de la Sade, Argentine Society of Writers. She is the Commissioner of Honor in the executive cabinet in the Educational and Social Relations Division of the UNACCC South America – Argentina Chapter.