Ida Vitale (Montevideo, 1923) is a poet, essayist, critic, translator, literature professor and the author of more than thirty books. These poems are from Mella y criba (Valencia: Pre-Textos, 2010). She was forced into exile in 1974 and since 1989 has lived in Austin, Texas. She has won Uruguay’s National Poetry Prize, the Octavio Paz and the Alfonso Reyes Prizes in Mexico, and the Reina Sofía Prize for Iberoamerican Poetry in Spain.