Happy New Year 2014 with Love Poetry in Three Languages

Love Poetry, Poetry for Love

To criticize poetry and understand it, one does not need to know a master in literature, yet one must know the different categories of poetry, be able to differentiate them, and have read enough of it to learn to naturally understand it. Although Kant, Aristotle and others can tell a lot about it, one does not need to understand them so well to attain transcendental‎ knowledge through poetry. A critic may be right or wrong about a poem or poetry in general, but it is indeed his or her opinion.

A poem of love for you

New York has sparks heat that radiates from your essence
When I hug you and feel true love in nearly all dimensions
Perhaps is just a matter of dreams not perhaps imagination
as nothing hinders more love that being close to your presence.


There is a vague fragrance that entices being firmly together
And the scent enhances the dawn breath that we embrace
as I feel the steam overflown with the beauty on your face
And the images of love revolves, revolves, revolves forever.


It is the moon without the earth, and the earth without the moon
It is the motion of waves dancing that go fearlessly forward
And feel the beating of hearts surrouing the romance at guard
The beauty of telling the true that loves resounds like a boom.


Un poème d’amour pour toi


Un poème d’amour qui raconte notre histoire
Un réveil symbolique, une solitude nomade, une promenade au solitaire
Tout ça me fait rappeler que tu m’aimes
C’est vrai: je m’en souviens et tout marche bien…


Mais c’est l’amour qui me possède
C’est à toi que je rencontre
au milieu d’un paysage fleuri
et c’est toi l’amour que Dieu me concède…


L’amour se promène aussi dans un endroit imaginaire
comme la seule rose dans le seule oasis d’un desert tout vert
Le satisfait un soif jamais si fort
Un soif dont l’eau que je bois provient de tes lèvres…


Et je vois par de-la les frontières
Où nous retrouvons à nouveau un endroit fleuri
pour y rester toutes les fatigues de nos angoisses
Nous y restons pour retrouver l’amour…


Mais enfin, tu t’en vas, tu t’en vas, tu t’en vas comme moi
C’est trop tard… c’est la fin, c’est la fin, c’est la fin…
On ne se revoit plus… On ne se revoit point…

Un poema de amor para tí

Insomnio en el alba


No puedo conciliar mi sueño, como tú el tuyo
me abruman los recuerdos y las voces de tu yo
me adormece la memoria dulce de tu anhelo
guardado para siempre en el aura de tu pelo.


La imperfección de mis versos nunca rima
mide una distancia en que viajamos en el tiempo
como en vagón inerme, llevado por tu aliento
el respirar de tus besos, tu boca que se arrima.


Te beso entre el tono de tu piel, silueta tendida
me gustas que me beses en el silencio de la bruma
es ir al mar de los olvidos que se hace espuma
es la vida que se va y se viene como en despedida.


Es el mar que me llama como si vinieras tu de adentro
es un gémido en una noche negra, vacía y ausente
es un hálito perdido que se aleja de lo presente
de un ser que nunca olvida tu recóndito epicentro.

My Favorite Poets (IV): The Spaniards (la Madre Patria y la hispanidad)

In a farmhouse in Cordoba between brambles and oleanders lived a saddler-man with a saddler-woman ...

Federico García Lorca in New York and the Other Spaniards

On García Lorca's Poet in New York

García Lorca in New York

Garcia Lorca's passport.

A picture relevant to García Lorca's works

The cancelled presentation

A Portrait of young Federico García Lorca

An acquaintance visits the García Lorca's exhibit at the NYPL on 42nd St at Fifth Avenue.

The recounting of the Missing Poet.

García Lorca at Columbia University.

A display of documents at the New York Public Library

La guitarra de la que el poeta habla en sus poemas

La Argentina

García Lorca's business correspondence.

Other Documents Originales y Correspondencia.

The Poet who would not return.

A Poet in New York

During my junior year in high-school, I got the chance to interpret the character of shoemaker in the La Zapatera Prodigiosa (The Shoemaker's Prodigious Wife) play by Federico García Lorca.  It was a fun experience which I shared with beautiful red-headed Rosalía Donofrio, who played the female saddler   After the high-school experience at Humboldt in the Normal School Theater, I eventually saw her as a psychology student at Universidad del Norte for a few years, and it is possible that we might have graduated on the same ceremony a few years later. However, this was my only major dramatic experience, as an actor with deep penetration in the psychological understanding of the character, and the social and personal content of the drama.

Just a few weeks ago, I walked into the lower level room at the New York Public Library on 42^nd Street and Fifth Avenue with an acquaintance to see the exhibit on Back Tomorrow, displaying a few important documents and late writings by Garcia Lorca, who happen to become my favorite Spaniard poet after my unique dramatic experience. The New York exhibit presented the scenario and documents prior to his death, and a collection of his literary works. García Lorca never return after his famous “back tomorrow”, as he was killed in Spain during the civil war. And his  book Poet in New York was published posthumously in 1940.

During my school and college years, there were several attempts for an insight in the Spanish literature and my only major interaction came along when I got a copy of La Vida es Sueño by [Don] Pedro Calderón de la Barca, which came to me accidentally, as it had been given as a reading assignment to my brother César at Colegio de San Francisco de Asís, and I stumbled onto the book and carefully read it.  As if dreams freed the soul, the topic of dreaming to live, or living the dream or trying to dream to attain what we might have physically or materially in the immediate future, became an important leit motif in some of my short stories, and has significantly influence the creative nature of my poetry from the hispanic perspective, beyond the most significant admiration and drills on Musset, Victor Hugo, Baudelaire, and some other of my favorite French poets.

However, the greatest and best known Spanish poet is probably Gustavo Adolfo Bécquer. He was indeed the most studied and analyzed through my formal school coursework. In particular, Rimas y Leyendas (Rhymes and Legends), represented the most significant work by a Spanish poet of his time.

Bécquer’s rhyme LIII (Rima LIII)

Volverán las oscuras golondrinas

En tu balcón sus nidos a colgar

Y otra vez con el ala a sus cristales,

Jugando llamarán.

Pero aquellas que el vuelo refrenaban

Tu hermosura y mi dicha a contemplar,

Aquellas que aprendieron nuestros nombres,

¡Esas... no volverán!

In English:

The dark swallows will return

their nests upon your balcony, to hang.

And again with their wings upon its windows,

Playing, they will call.

But those who used to slow their flight

your beauty and my happiness to watch,

Those, that learned our names,

Those... will not come back!

Rhyme XXI (Rima XXI)

¿Qué es poesía?, dices mientras clavas

en mi pupila tu pupila azul.

¡Qué es poesía! ¿Y tú me lo preguntas?

Poesía... eres tú.

A harsh translation into English reads:

What is poetry? you ask, while fixing

your blue pupil onto mine.

What is poetry! And you are asking me?

Poetry... is yourself.

And through my life, I have indeed read many antologies on the Spanish literature.  Beyond my admiration of Don Quijote and my studies both in Spanish Literature and through French Literature studies on Le Quixote in comparison to La Chanson de Rolland and other Gallic and French Troubadour writings, and further beyond my literary analysis of the Spanish historic and Spanish historic-religious genres in the novel category, there have been many poets that have certainly impressed me. The list is simply too long, but I could highlight some such as:

Rafael Alberti (1902–1999), Vicente Aleixandre (1898–1984) - Nobel Laureate 1977, Dámaso Alonso (1898–1990),  Gustavo Adolfo Bécquer (1836–1870), Baltasar del Alcázar (1530–1606), Jorge Guillén (1893–1984), Juan Ramón Jiménez (1881–1958) - Nobel Laureate 1956, Antonio Machado (1875–1936), Pedro Salinas (1892–1951),Garcilaso de la Vega (1503–1536),José de Espronceda (1808–1842). They have mostly influenced South American poets, such as Jorge Luis Borges, César Vallejo, and Guillermo Valencia, among others.

But finally retaking García Lorca, it was an exciting experience to visit his exhibit an enjoy with friends and acquaintances of various nationalities a celebration of our Hispanic culture.

Poems by García Lorca

Adam

A tree of blood soaks the morning
where the newborn woman groans.
Her voice leaves glass in the wound
and on the panes, a diagram of bone.

The coming light establishes and wins
white limits of a fable that forgets
the tumult of veins in flight
toward the dim cool of the apple.

Adam dreams in the fever of the clay
of a child who comes galloping
through the double pulse of his cheek.

But a dark other Adam is dreaming
a neuter moon of seedless stone
where the child of light will burn.

Adivinanza De La Guitarra

En la redonda
encrucijada,
seis doncellas
bailan.
Tres de carne
y tres de plata.
Los sueños de ayer las buscan
pero las tiene abrazadas
un Polifemo de oro.
¡La guitarra!

Cantos Nuevos

Dice la tarde: '¡Tengo sed de sombra!'

Dice la luna: '¡Yo, sed de luceros!'

La fuente cristalina pide labios

y suspira el viento.

Yo tengo sed de aromas y de risas,

sed de cantares nuevos

sin lunas y sin lirios,

y sin amores muertos.

Un cantar de mañana que estremezca

a los remansos quietos

del porvenir. Y llene de esperanza

sus ondas y sus cienos.

Un cantar luminoso y reposado

pleno de pensamiento,

virginal de tristeza y de angustias

y virginal de ensueños.

Cantar sin carne lírica que llene

de risas el silencio

(una bandada de palomas ciegas

lanzadas al misterio).

Cantar que vaya al alma de las cosas

y al alma de los vientos

y que descanse al fin en la alegría

del corazón eterno.

Garcia Lorca’s Main Works

Poetry collections

•   Impresiones y paisajes (Impressions and Landscapes 1918)

•   Libro de poemas (Book of Poems 1921)

•   Poema del cante jondo (Poem of Deep Song; written in 1921 but not published until 1931)

•   Suites (written between 1920 and 1923, published posthumously in 1983)

•   Canciones (Songs written between 1921 and 1924, published in 1927)

•   Romancero gitano (Gypsy Ballads 1928)

•   Odes (written 1928)

•   Poeta en Nueva York (written 1930 – published posthumously in 1940, first translation into English as The Poet in New York 1940)[57]

•   Seis poemas gallegos (Six Galician poems 1935)

•   Sonetos del amor oscuro (Sonnets of Dark Love 1936, not published until 1983)

•   Lament for the Death of a Bullfighter and Other Poems (1937)

•   Primeras canciones (First Songs 1936)

Play

•   Christ: A Religious Tragedy (unfinished 1917)

•   El maleficio de la mariposa (The Butterfly's Evil Spell: written 1919–20, first production 1920)

•   Los títeres de Cachiporra (The Billy-Club Puppets: written 1922-5, first production 1937)

•   Mariana Pineda (written 1923–25, first production 1927)

•   La zapatera prodigiosa (The Shoemaker's Prodigious Wife: written 1926–30, first production 1930, revised 1933)

•   El público (The Public: written 1929–30, first production 1972)

•   Así que pasen cinco años (When Five Years Pass: written 1931, first production 1945)

•   Bodas de sangre (Blood Wedding: written 1932, first production 1933)

•   Comedia sin título (Play Without a Title: written 1936, first production 1986)

•   La casa de Bernarda Alba (The House of Bernarda Alba: written 1936, first production 1945)

Los sueños de mi prima Aurelia (Dreams of my Cousin Aurelia: unfinished 1938)

Announcing Alma Mater II

Love Poetry, Poetry for Love


Surreal is our Love will be my best poetry book to reach romantic and non-romantic readers recall or revive their experience in an Alma Mater anywhere in the world. i have recently written some poems for that book.




Petit Amour, Grand Amour

Petit amour qui me baise

petit amour qui me caresse

je veux retenir ce sentiment-là

qui me fait plaisir pour ton amour… Ça va!

Grand amour qui me baise

ta voix féminine agrandit les rêveries de mes rêveries

grand amour de femme qui me caresse ainsi

avec une voix douce et jolie, elle détruit toutes mes faiblesses…

Petit amour, tout au cœur, qui prit si fortement

des vers qui ne resemblent plus d’aujourd’hui

mais d’autrefois, au temps auquel je te vois encore naïve…

Grand amour qui m’aime au secret de la lune ouverte

cet amour qui parle candidement des textes inconnus

et me laisse l’esprit élévé et l’espoir face aux feuilles vertes…

Petit amour qui me baise, petit amour qui me caresse

je veux bien que tu me plaises…

petit amour... grand amour…

Milonga Douce

Gardel chante au profund du cœur

tandis que Brel se montre au style de Brassens

ses voix sont intenses et romantiques,

tel que l’un de tes mots tardifs

où le rythme létargique devient de véritable turbulence

comme si l’amour s’en allait, comme si l’amour s’en venait…

et on y danse au rythme de l’amour,

au rythme des cœurs qui battent

l’un fort contre l’autre…

Tango Allegro

The movements are filled with cadence

while a love mystery remains just steady

arguably expecting a word of truth…

An answer that navigates our imagination

flying hands contrast rhythmic arms

robust steps move your shoes.

Graceful tango, flows the night full of peace 

and unforgettable remembrance

nothing to regret between us,
yet I just see the shadows of your feelings

inspired time over time…

Far away in the East is the abandoned truth

fearful of an endless return, a one time visit to the West

like a sensual, erotic night, filled with your holy beauty

which ended all the suffering in one Bohemian night.

The liqueur, scaled, not abundant, enough for the extended night

arousal of passion, bright au Claire de Lune

and on top of the full moon, naive, in my own boots

I conquer the spirit, the recall that pays for your return…

La Joven Mujer y el vino

Dulce voz que despierta el amanecer de mi mocedad

quiero que regreses a mí como un alba en que anduvimos juntos

en que nos bebimos todo el vino escarlata del olvido

y muy alegres cantamos juntos una canción por la verdad…

Como si tuviésemos sueños a escondidas
y a hurtadillas amara yo las caricias de tu pelo
que tiene el secreto furtivo de tu arrullo
nacido en un encuentro vespertino que nos une…

Me besas y acaricias sin mentiras
como la otra que quiere poseerme
cuando existe una sola en mi camino
y eres tú, y nadie más, pues yo te amo…

Me gusta el canto de tu voz ardiendo viva

un deseo ferviente nos anima

te amo en desespero, y nunca te olvido

te amo siempre, siempre eres mi destino…


La Mar

La mar me ama con sus besos

que vienen y se van con la resaca

es intermitente

como el amor de una mujer…