Longings
2005; Johns Hopkins University Press; Volume: 28; Issue: 4 Linguagem: Inglês
10.1353/cal.2006.0025
ISSN1080-6512
Autores Tópico(s)Cuban History and Society
ResumoLongings Nancy Morejón (bio) Translated by David Frye (bio) Not the sky but its shadow lying across the water Not the sea but its shadow sunken in the depths Not the sand but my friend its shadow Not my friend the monte but its shadow within the night Not the fire but the shadow of its metallic tongue Not the wind but the watery arc of the islands Not the ghost of deserted houses but the shadow of a world beyond Not the all but its one and only shadow on a one and only stone Not the whole dream but its long partial shadow drifting towards the beginning of a brief fantasy No single language but the harsh buzz or soft hum of each word Not all music but the timeless sound of a single song set not in our voices but in the voice of a young girl bewitched by the magic carpet of freedom Not the hurricane's lightning bolt but the shadow of its flash on the rushing creek Not the waterfall but its silver thread plunging into the abyss Not the abyss but the leap of a tightrope walker already out of breath Not the palm tree on the green plain but its solitude in the shadow of a wayward manjuarí Not the labyrinth but the screaming of its mirrors Not the downpour of the planets but the rains escorted by the ferries of summer Not the watery coastline but the shadow of the coral reef endlessly waiting Not the knife but the shadow of its blade across your eyes Not the almighty one but our loved ones tracing their own shadows day by day dropping a virgin anchor by the shore of any port of this world, at this hour [End Page 924] Nancy Morejón Nancy Morejón—poet, literary critic, and translator—is author of a number of volumes of poems, including Richard trajo se flauta, Cuarderno de Granada, and Elogio de la danza. Her critical essays are Lengua de P‡jaro, Recopilaci—n de textos sobre Nicol‡s Guill n, and Naci—n y mestizaje en Nicol‡s Guill n. Morejón, who majored in French as an undergraduate student, is the first black Cuban to graduate from the University of Havana in Cuba. David Frye David Frye is Program Associate in Latin American and Caribbean Studies at the University of Michigan. He has translated ten books from Spanish into English, including most recently Fern‡ndez de Lizardi's The Mangy Parrot(Hackett Publishing, 2004) and The Mangy Parrot, Abridged (Hackett Publishing, 2005). He translated the selected poems in Nancy Morejón's With Eyes and Soul: Images of Cuba (with photographs by Milton Rogovin). Notes Monte: the undomesticated countryside, the wild; the sacred landscape of Afrocuban spiritual practices Manjuari: the Cuban gar, a large and ancient-looking freshwater fish [End Page 925] Copyright © 2005 Charles H. Rowell
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