This is The Writer's Voice, new fiction from The New Yorker.

I'm Deborah Triesman, fiction editor at The New Yorker.

On this episode of The Writer's Voice, we'll hear Alejandro Zombra read his story Skyscrapers,

which was translated from the Spanish by Megan McDowell,

and appeared in the August 22nd, 2022 issue of the magazine.

Zombra is a Chilean poet and fiction writer whose books translated into English include multiple choice,

Chilean poet and bonsai, his first novel, which was published in a new translation this month.

Now here's Alejandro Zombra.

Skyscrapers.

I didn't go to New York because I didn't want to cut my hair,

and my father didn't read my letter to my father.

I read it next time I feel like crying, he told me,

except I never feel like crying.

I didn't know how to respond.

I never knew how to respond.

That was why I wrote.

That's why I write.

I write a replies to I don't think of at the time,

or drafts of those replies really.

The first time I tried to write this story, for example, I erased you.

I thought it would be possible to conceal your absence,

as if you simply hadn't shown up for that day's performance,

...