tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6027401667607911457.post6013730906855362216..comments2023-12-29T10:38:29.386-05:00Comments on Poets of the Caribbean: 5 Interesting Things About Nicolas GuillenYasmin Moraishttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01052235256064726816noreply@blogger.comBlogger4125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6027401667607911457.post-16582937555072570212013-01-23T21:13:33.693-05:002013-01-23T21:13:33.693-05:00Leonard,
Thanks for sharing Guillen's Angela ...Leonard,<br /><br />Thanks for sharing Guillen's Angela Davis poem. This was the first time I ever saw the poem, and I enjoyed reading it. I am really glad you posted it for the readers.Yasmin Moraishttps://www.blogger.com/profile/01052235256064726816noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6027401667607911457.post-71322101100801747352013-01-23T04:24:38.541-05:002013-01-23T04:24:38.541-05:00Please post another beautiful Revolutionary poem b...Please post another beautiful Revolutionary poem by Nicholas Guillen:<br /><br /><br />Angela Davis by Nicolas Guillen—the Cuban Revolution’s poet-laureate<br />( posted in granma for poetry – December 17, 2011)<br /><br />(Translation by Roberto Marquez) <br /><br />I have not come to tell you you are beautiful.<br />I believe you are beautiful,<br />but that is not the issue.<br />The issue is they want you dead.<br />They need your skull<br />to decorate the tent of the Great Chief,<br />beside the skulls of Jackson and Lumumba.<br /><br />And, Angela,<br />we need your smile.<br /><br />We are going to change the walls hate has constructed,<br />for the transparent walls of air,<br />and the roof of your anguish,<br />for a roof of clouds and birds,<br />and the guard who conceals you,<br />for an archangel with his sword.<br /><br />How your executioners mislead themselves!<br />You are made of rough and glowing stuff,<br />a rustproof impulse,<br />capable of lasting through suns and rains,<br />through winds and moons<br />in the unsheltered air.<br /> You belong to <br />that class of dreams in which time<br />has always forged its statues <br />and written its songs.<br /><br />Angela, I am not before your name<br />to speak to you of love like an adolescent,<br />or to desire you like a satyr.<br />That, alas, is not the issue.<br />I merely say that you are strong, resilient<br />enough to leap at (and fracture) the neck<br />of those who have wanted , still want, and will always <br /> want <br />to see you burned alive bound to the south of your<br /> country,<br />bound to a cinder post,<br />bound to a leafless oak,<br />bound to a burning cross alive bound to the South.<br /><br />The enemy is clumsy.<br />He wants to silence your voice with his own,<br />but we all know,<br />your voice alone resounds,<br />that it alone ignites <br />high in the night like an exploding column ,<br />an arrested lighting flash,<br />a vertical consuming fire,<br />a recurring thunderbolt beneath whose light we glimpse<br />Blacks with fiery nails,<br />weakened and angry people.<br /><br />Beneath the dream accomplished where I live<br />beside the decisive militia,<br />by the bitter edge of this terrible but friendly sea,<br />watching furious waves collapse on the breakers,<br />I yell, and make my voice travel on the shoulders<br />of the great passing wind<br />my wind our father the Caribbean.<br /><br />Angela I say your name, vociferate. I join my hands<br />not in pleas, entireties, supplications, prayers <br />to your jailers for your pardon<br />but in applauding action, hand meeting hand,<br />hard and strong, very strong,<br />hand meeting hand so that you will know I’m yours!<br />Leonard Dabydeenhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/13128470650180652136noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6027401667607911457.post-74083278076410589112013-01-15T21:51:17.787-05:002013-01-15T21:51:17.787-05:00Leonard,
Thanks for sharing this Guillen poem, Am...Leonard,<br /><br />Thanks for sharing this Guillen poem, Ample Blood. It is very touching. Thanks also for sharing the Eduardo Garcia Delgado story. I appreciate your feedback.Yasmin Moraishttps://www.blogger.com/profile/01052235256064726816noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6027401667607911457.post-85346567817705652242013-01-15T15:23:50.473-05:002013-01-15T15:23:50.473-05:00Ample Blood by Nicholas Guillen
Eduardo Garcia De...Ample Blood by Nicholas Guillen<br /><br />Eduardo Garcia Delgado, was a young soldier who wrote the name of Fidel with his<br />own blood on a door in a building in Ciudad Libertad just before he died, after<br />being gunned down by the US backed mercenary air force during the criminal<br />bombings of April 15, 1961.<br /><br />When this soldier who died<br /><br />for his country wrote Fidel<br /><br />with his blood, do not say a Miserere:<br /><br />that blood is a sign that<br /><br />the Homeland lives.<br /><br />When without voice,<br /><br />he cannot find<br /><br />words to express himself,<br /><br />do not tell him to be quiet,<br /><br />for in the pure tongue of the Homeland<br /><br />it resounds.<br /><br />When his body falls<br /><br />lifeless to the ground keen to cover him,<br /><br />do not say that he rests,<br /><br />as for the Homeland he shines and works<br /><br />upstanding.<br /><br />Now no-one can stop his<br /><br />joint and open heart.<br /><br />Do not say that he has gone:<br /><br />his ample blood remains part of the Homeland<br /><br />Nicolás Guillén<br /><br />(Translated by Mike Phillips)<br /><br /><br />Leonard Dabydeenhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/13128470650180652136noreply@blogger.com