Brachiation

"Ah, but a man's reach should exceed his grasp,

or what's a heaven for?"

Robert Browning

                              From branch
to branch
                 and on to vine,
                        from vine     to vine     on down    the line
and then to branch again,        to swing
                and sway with grace      from limb     
         to limb:
it's this I miss when in the hall
I walk from end to end and all
that I can do is walk, not swing:
there are no bars from which to limb-
erly sashay and sway along.
Is it because our arms aren't strong
that we neglect to hang such rails?
Is it the length the swing entails?
But practice would make stronger arms
and maybe even longer arms.
Perhaps to grow prehensile tails
                   like spider monkey as he sails
                                      from hand          to foot
                                                                            to tail
                       to hand
to foot is what we're missing, and
to mark some lanes, so those who want
to swing won't crash with those who jaunt,
and sporting satchels as we swing,
to hold those things we need to bring.
To my mind, we must act with haste!
I feel my muscles go to waste
each time I venture down the hall.
But, do palms have the wherewithal
to callus around like clocks' ticks?
Would that tail sprout from my coccyx?
Would my spine find relief someday
from all those popping vertebrae?
It may be that I'll never know.
The reach above my head grows, though:
imagination is my fate
until I
             grasp
                                              to brachiate.

Pulpos enchipotlados

Pulpos enchipotlados pidió, encabronado, Chimalpopoca, el monarca mexica.

"A poco," protestó Popocacuitlahuac, procurador culinario del palacio plenipotenciario.

De puro coraje, Popocacuitlahuac se encomendó a Tezcatlipoca, y se puso como cohete a correr camino a Quiahuiztlan, pasando por Popocatépetl con mucha prisa pero con poca convicción. Por allá por Coatepec a poco se encharca en el chapopote del camino polvoriento. Por fin en Coatzacoalcos pudo calar la choza de un pescador a quien le propuso la chamba del capricho de Chimalpopoca.

"Poca...Coatlicue," profirió el pescador coatzacoalquense al apoderarse del encargo. Pero a los pocos pudo producir los pulpos provenidos de las profundidades.

"Y, ¿me presta un poquito de chipotle?" preguntó Popocacuitlahuac.

"En Papantla puede que compartan, pero no se ponga a platicar como perico al componer conversación con los totonaco-parlantes, porque ni popolucas ni popolocas, pues."

Por poco que parezca, al comparecer Popocacuitlahuac en aquel pueblo pintoresco, se percató de que algún que otro totonaco se echaba sus comentarios en náhuatl.  

Propuso un totonaco chipotlero, "Por una pizquita de pulpo te proporciono el poco conocido pero palpablemente codiciado chipotle marca Panchito Chapopote de la casa Xavier Icaza."

"Propuesta concordada," manifestó Popocacuitlahuac, pellizcando un cachito de pulpo. 

Apresurado paseó Popocacuitlahuac nuevamente por las calzadas y los canales de la capital de Anahuac, hasta ponerse a los pies del tlatoani Chimalpopoca.

Ante toda la corte chismeó Chimalpopoca, "Ya se me pasó el poco antojo que me picó por el aperitivo. Además, Popocacuitlahuac, tienes cara de enchocolatado. Te has de haber tropezado por allá por Perote, porque estos pulpos enchipotlados están enchapopotlados."

A la postre, y como castigo, a Popocacuitlahuac lo pintaron por completo de chapopote enchipotlado, causándole un escozor poco cómodo.

Colorín colorado, este cuento se ha enchipotlado.

a alma rendida

o que é que é essa coisa chamada de multiculturalismo?

um sustantivo insustentável.

paira um fio, e outro, e mais outro,

no limiar de uma teia de aranha.
os fios se agitam, de cores apenas visíveis.

a luz não passa: habita.

transcende

porque não há o que passar.

eis o perigo de manter a alma aberta,

de esticá-la além do sei lá:

o paradoxo de sentir cada vapor do vento

sem resistir ser parte do ar.

o que é que é essa tentativa de definir

uma idéia tão intangível

quanto o multiculturalismo

quando sentido, vivido,

no limiar que é uma teia de aranha?

aliás faz tempo 

a aranha, 
fonte das cores enfiadas,
desistiu

e se foi

muito

embora.

Exvotos por doquier

Las muelas de juicio

da la Facultad de Derecho

duelen con más juicio 

que las de la Facultad de Siniestro.

El meñique le chismea al pulgar

y salta tres dedos para retomar su lugar.

El pezón oprimido quiso levantarse en protesta.

El pezón lamido pudo levantarse por placer.

Truena el tobillo,

no sin antes caer

el relámpiego.

Osa la mano
manosear

la nalga o el seno,

oh, cuando ostentados,
porque diseñados

para ser manoseados.

  Piel: pergamino peludo de pliegues, perforaciones, y protuberancias.

Los ojos son los pozos del espíritu.

Ventanas del alma, ¡mis narices!

Vuelve la vulva de su viaje en barco

--el constante meneo, la marea de sal--

hecha concha que resuena con el rumor del mar.

Regalo del descanso

es el regazo

y el que más lo disfruta

lo ocupa desde el embarazo.

¿Mejilla o cachete?
Pues no es lo mismo mejillón que cachetón.

Los penes, la mayoría del tiempo, cuelgan bajo la raya, como comas, de tipografía diversa, pero a veces, en casos de turgencia, se convierten en puntos, ¡de admiración!

El perineo marca la frontera

entre la pompa francesa 

y la nalga española.

Una uña luna

se torna sol

con brillo

de esmalte.

  

De San Francisco de Sales el votivo 

está hecho de cerilla del oído.

"Erase un hombre a una nariz pegado,"

escribió Quevedo,

que era un hombre a unos lentes pegado.

¿Reloj de sol?

Cualquier extremidad despejada.

¡AuXilio! ¡La aXila está asfiXiada de antioXidante!

La vitamina D es nudo

del sol con el desnudo. 

Más exvotos aquí y aquí.

Angeles de nieve

¿Angeles de nieve? ¡Angeles de nieve!

Dios mío, ¿qué diablos son

los ángeles de nieve?

¿Son como aquellos hombres de nieve,

hechos bolas, que vi en pantalla?

No, hijo mío. El angel de nieve

lo haces bien acostadito en la nieve,

viendo hacia el cielo,

y moviéndote las extremidades

como el vitruviano desvestido de Da Vinci,

como el náufrago enamorado de Neruda.

Esos artistas entendieron que el angel

es la impresión que dejas

sobre la faz de la tierra.

Mide el tamaño de tu alcance

y el tiempo de tu aguante.

Cuando sale el sol, se derrite la imagen

pero no el recuerdo de tu impresión,

de tus capacidades y de tus anhelos alados.

¡El frío que haría, Dios mío!

¡Angeles de arena, ángeles de arena!

Aquí en los trópicos: ¿se puede?

Sí, hijo, también. Sí se puede.

(Este poema, encomendado por Luis Moreno, aparece también en su blog de poesía de ángeles.)

Huehuetlatolli

Nos dio mucho gusto estar con Uds. Uds. nos recibieron y nos llevaron a su casa, y allá comimos y dormimos, y pasamos mucho tiempo con Uds. Gracias, hijita, gracias, porque nos dio mucho gusto estar con Uds. Lo pasamos muy bien con Uds. allá en su casa.

Escuché estas palabras, que mi suegro le decía a mi hija, en una sala de espera en el aeropuerto de Dallas. Mis suegros regresaban a México, después de haber pasado unas semanas con nosotros en Oklahoma. Como digo, escuché estas palabras con compasión, reconociendo como siempre la voz de mi suegro y su manera de hablar.

Pero de repente pensé en la categoría de discursos nahuas que se llaman huehuetlatolli, o "discursos de los ancianos." Me di cuenta de que mi suegro, con sus setenta años y su apellido náhuatl, y a pesar de su Alzheimer's, estaba en ese momento incorporando aquella tradición mesoamericana.

Y pensé: no es exageración. Esos discursos se memorizaban, se pasaban de padres a hijos para ser recitados en eventos especiales, tales como despedidas y bienvenidas, la mayoría de edad, la encomendación antes de una batalla, etc. Eran, y son, discursos que destacan lo formulaico de la retórica náhuatl, con sus difrasismos, paralelismos, y repeticiones típicas de un idioma más hablado que escrito.

Pensé en otras ocasiones en las que había yo presenciado los huehuetlatolli de mi suegro quien, por ser el mayor de siete hijos, tal vez heredó ese estilo: cuando le pedí la mano de su hija en matrimonio (¡el "rollo" que nos echó aquella tarde!); los varios brindis de Año Nuevo y otros eventos por el estilo; las presentaciones formales, que había tenido que traducir yo, ante mis parientes.

Y sin duda, con los siglos y con el idioma castellano se han modificado los huehuetlatolli. Y tal vez mi suegro incorpora la tradición menos por práctica familiar que por el estilo general del habla mexicano (aunque creo más bien que importan los dos factores por igual). Pero afirmo que eso fue lo que reconocí en las palabras de mi suegro, que le seguía hablando a mi hija:

Qué bueno que pudimos jugar juntos, y bailar juntos. Escuchamos mucha música. ¡Tú bailas muy bien! Por eso vinimos tu abuelita y yo, para jugar con Uds. y bailar con Uds. Por eso nos gusta venir a estar con Uds, contigo y con tu hermanita y con tu papá y tu mamá. Por eso vinimos. Pero ya es la hora de que nos vayamos.

Yo creo que son precisamente el ritmo y la repetición del discurso que le ayudan a mi suegro a continuar incorporando la tradición a pesar de su Alzheimer's. Cuando había acabado de hablar, le conté a mi hija la importancia, como legado cultural, de lo que había escuchado. Le aconsejé que atesorara esos momentos vividos con el abuelo. Después, rumbo a casa, compartí la observación con mi esposa también. Concordamos que sí, bien parece ser que la tradición oral de los huehuetlatolli vive aun en mi suegro, aunque dudamos de que pueda sobrevivir otra generación.

Mientras tanto: momentos preciosos, el descubrimiento de un tesoro florido.

Blasphemous Beasts

Tuesday, 15 May 1543

Producing his rustic spyglass from the inner pocket of his frock, Padre Bohórquez commenced his daily monitoring of the painting of the cathedral ceiling. A dozen Zapotec painters stood high above him on the scaffolding, their brushes at their sides, awaiting his approval. Apprentices, they had been rendering the sacred images of saints and angels as instructed at the studio workshop of their maestro José Bene Chhbe', who stood among them.

Even though his aging hands trembled, the padre could still see through his spyglass that the beatific face of San Juan Bautista had been filled in since yesterday, and a layer of anil blue had been added to the Virgen María's robe, just as he had instructed. He nodded approvingly.

Turning slowly, Padre Bohórquez panned through other canonical scenes--the martyrdom of San Antonio, the conversion of San Pablo--until he found the freshly sketched cartoon of Adam and Eve, chastely concealed behind shrubbery in a paradisaical forest.  They stood under the Tree of Knowledge, the padre assumed, but then why were the apples so green and wrinkly? The serpent--those garish colors--and in the tree, macaws and toucans? Spider monkeys hanging from their...?

"Blasphemy," Padre Bohórquez croaked. He cleared his throat and yelled, "Blasphemy!"

José Bene Chhbe' began to climb down the scaffolding. "Why do you shout this word, Your Reverence? Why do you make such a serious accusation?"

"These beasts!" The padre gestured with his spyglass. "These parrots and monkeys are not mentioned in the Bible! They did not board the ark with Noah! To say nothing of these awful pears! They have no name in the Book of the Word of God!"

"Does Your Reverence mean that the migu with his fantastic tail and the be'ewe with his splendorous plumage, to say nothing of the heavenly taste of the ya'shu, are not God's creations?"

"Of course not!" fumed the flustered padre. "We are all God's creatures and God's children! But these migu and whatever you call them live here. They do not live in the Holy Land."

José turned and winked at his apprentices. "Then does Your Reverence mean that the Lord our God has no dominion over this land of La'a, this land you call Oaxaca, Nueva España?"

"Our Heavenly Father rules the Earth and Skies!" fulminated the padre with a cough. "You know that! Why do you persist in these blasphemous expressions!"

"Padre Bohórquez, the bishop will come to visit on Saturday, no? We will leave this section be until he can see it."

The spyglass shook in the padre's hands. "On top of everything else you've done, you are challenging my authority? The insolence..."

"Padre, how long have we been working together? Three years? You know that I was trained in the capital under the patronage of the diocese. You know that my apprentices and I do good work. We paint from what we know."

"When the bishop arrives on Saturday he will support me unconditionally. If you leave that painting as is, it's only because I can't climb up there myself to erase those creatures." The padre shook his fist in frustration and walked out of the cathedral.

José broke into an epiphanic smile. "Friends, we need to do some trapping before Saturday."

Saturday, 19 May 1543

"Yes, of course I'd like to see the paintings, padre. Isn't José Bene Chhbe' in charge?"

Padre Bohórquez stepped from the street onto the threshold of the human-size door carved into the huge portón. "Please understand, Your Excellency, that his apprentice painters have taken exuberant liberties."

"Padre, if it helps the children of God find their way to mass, so much the better."

Padre Bohórquez opened the door and caught sight of a flash of crimson. He heard hooting and shrieking coming from beyond the vestibule. Brandishing his spyglass, he entered shouting, "What disturbs the House of the Lord?"

But he was not prepared for the answer. His eyes first registered that the rough-hewn pews had been upended in a corner by one of the altars, next  to the scaffolding pushed out of the way. His ears registered a human voice hushing other voices.

The two men-of-the-cloth rounded the corner of the vestibule into the nave. Standing in the vacant Paradise-painted altar niche, José greeted them. "Your Excellency, Your Reverence, behold: The Garden of Eden!"

On this signal, some of José's apprentices, crouching to the sides of the scene, pushed potted trees and other plants to the middle of the floor while others began playing drums and a wood flute. One of the apprentices stepped quickly past the dumbstruck padre and bishop to close the street entrance.

José began to narrate the second chapter of Genesis, and from behind one of the trees Adam appeared on cue, contriving to cover his groin with a belt of leaves. Adam acted out the naming of the animals, in Zapotec, as they were released from cages and nets by his fellow painters: monkeys and coatis, macaws and toucans. A spider monkey came to tug on the robe of the padre, who made to protest but was stifled by the bishop.

Then Adam pantomimed the sleep of the excised bone, and from behind another tree appeared Eve, wearing the expected leaf belts and looking quite apprehensive.

At this the padre could no longer contain himself and queried, "You there, Adam, is this your wife?"

Adam bowed. "Yes, Your Reverence."

"Proceed," said the bishop, with an irritated glance at the padre.

Both men were soon startled by an apprentice holding a snake, playing the part of the Serpent. Eve and Adam were tempted with an avocado, seduced, and reprimanded by the voice of José as God. Another stage helper brought crude clothes for Adam and Eve to hide their newly conceived shame, but at that moment paradise lost: there was a loud thunk as a coati knocked over the large cross on the chancel. All eyes turned and observed a macaw splashing and preening in the baptismal font, two spider monkeys fighting over some communion wafers, and the coati proceeding to rip and devour a page from the Bible laying open on the altar.

"Blasphemous beasts!" the padre spat out.

But the bishop began to chuckle as the padre and the painters ran and climbed all over the nave trying to catch the animals. They were soon joined by Adam and Eve, whose leaf coverings quickly disintegrated even as they chased the particularly noisy and irate howler monkey who had stolen their clothes. By now the bishop was doubling over, searching for a place to sit down, he was laughing so hard. José brought him a chair.

The padre managed to corner the heretic coati, but just at that moment a spider monkey filched his spyglass. The disheveled padre sputtered and coughed in desperation. He leaned against a side altar rail to regain his breath, only to cringe and recoil when he noticed the snake slithering toward him.

"It's only a sunbeam snake!" yelled José. "Harmless!"

But the frightened padre lurched against an upended pew and was promptly pelted with an avocado by the spider monkey perched precariously on top. As the padre backed away, wiping green paste from his robe, he knocked over one of the potted trees, from which a startled toucan flew in raucous protest.

The bishop, and now José too, were gasping and heaving, tears streaming down their cheeks. Everywhere around them was confusion and disaster, shrieks and howls and thumps, feathers and fur and bare skin: Eve and Adam had re-assumed their original innocence as they continued the hunt for their coverings. This chaos lasted for another good hour until the animals had been contained and José's crew lay or sat on the cathedral floor, exhausted.

Sunday, 20 May 1543

Sweating and gasping, Padre Bohórquez awakened from a disturbing dream. He had been walking naked through a wasteland inhabited by winged monkeys and prehensile-tailed parrots...

Smiling and humming, José Bene Chhbe' awakened from a pleasant dream. He had been walking nude through a paradise inhabited by winged monkeys and prehensile-tailed parrots...

The cathedral bell rang for morning mass. The curious joined the faithful filing through the vestibule; all Oaxaca had learned of the painters' bold but failed staging of paradise. As the congregants entered they saw and heard the animals, once again in their cages and nets and placed around the chancel.

Padre Bohórquez began the service. The congregation noted that the incense, once lit, seemed to calm and quiet the animals. The padre introduced the bishop, who first made a point of blessing the animals as representatives of all God's creation on this continent. Then the bishop called forth José Bene Chhbe' and his craftsmen, to commission the completion of the murals and to bless their work to that end. Finally, the bishop gave a sermon on the Fall of Man and Woman, and God's Forgiveness, before officiating communion.

The painters kept the animals for a few days as live models, then they returned the animals to the wild. They finished their murals, to much acclaim, by the end of the year.

Postdata: 1936

Oaxacan artisan Pedro Linares, ill with a high fever, dreamt of uncanny animals. They were mixed beasts, among them a winged donkey and a horned rooster, living in a kind of paradise. Perhaps in his dream he intuited an unorthodox interpretation of the Garden of Eden as a legacy from the cathedral's first painters. Their work, imagined here in the Cathedral of Our Lady of the Assumption in Oaxaca, would have long since been destroyed by fire and earthquake over the centuries, given the particular history of that cathedral. But many Baroque churches of Latin America are still adorned with Neotropical wildlife alongside Biblical figures. Linares' dream inspired his creation of those riotously colored, wondrously blasphemous beasts, the ever-popular alebrijes.

muiraquitã

das 

águas nasce,

feita a forma

do barro do fundo,

peixe, ou rã, ou jacaré

para se pendurar no colo

do amado, 

no peito perto

do coração e seus fluxos,

ou mesmo para se colocar

no lábio perforado e perorado

"fez da muiraquitã um tembetá"

unindo a origem, a sopa primordial

ao lugar da fala, ao óculo que produz

esses sons que chamamos de língua

de lembrança de linguagem de lírica

de lama-gole de lambe-garganta 

de lamento-gargarejo e de lascívia-gula
da longe origem lingüística vem a muiraquitã 

Calavera palinesca

Huesuda como ninguna,
de lengua muy afilada
--diríase de obsidiana--
pero de sesos, pues nada,
la Catrina palinesca
con su sonrisa malvada
osa ser la más dentuda
de todas nuestras calacas.
En revista y en pantalla
va de boca destapada
echando aires cual tetera
de ideas vaporizadas.

Mamá Osa medio ósea,
ruge como desalmada
aunque su ideología
anda desarticulada:
más que flaca, es esquelética,
de sustancia como emaciada.
Y de tanto escasear
cuando de ideas se trata,
se nos muere poco a poco,
quedándose descarnada.

Por la boca entra la mosca,
por la boca se va el habla,
por la boca muere el pez,
por ahi va el cuento de Sarah.

Vampiros vocálicos

Aquellos murciélagos de escalofrío,
paradigma de todos los quirópteros,
los que tachan injustamente
con su sangrienta reputación
a la mayoría de murciélagos del mundo,
insectívoros y frugívoros
--porque no poesívoros y prosívoros,
viven solamente en las Américas,
prole maya que son de Camazotz,
jeroglíficos herméticos echados a volar.
Perforan la piel, chupan la sangre, minan las fuerzas
alfabésticas.
Lastiman la persona, y también el tiempo,
de las conjugaciones.
Socavan la comprensión de ideas e imágenes.
La víctima queda demasiado extenuada
como para querer decir algo.

Esos vampiros
vocálicos y voladores,
en el pior de los casos,
infecton.
Chpan la sngre y dejan el sstma semóntic-circlatrio
campromutide.
De hacha, la rumontizacn do lus vmporas
doju micho, pura machi,
a la emagenoceán.
Despós d an atiqui vecúloca
una qiad cumi disuroantude.

Pur isi hey tint artuste
vonguordaste
fonáticu
di las vimperes.

carambola

CARAMBOLA! 

fruta estrela

verdeamarela

pontiaguda

cápsula bicuda

(foto: http://www.apriliani.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/05/carambola.jpg)

Mesoamerican Motifs at Tulsa Zoo

The Tropical American Rainforest exhibit at Tulsa Zoo features an anaconda, a jaguar, sloths, marmosets, spoonbills, howler monkeys, poison dart frogs, and many other species. The interior of the building itself was carefully decorated with copies of design motifs from the Maya and other Neotropical cultures, and the entrance is flanked by a replica of a colossal Olmec head sculpture. In the photos below: mural (Bonampak) and sculptural reproductions from the exhibit, including part of a sequence showing the Mayan numerical signs.

Cordel das Iaras Irmãs

Venho contar pra vocês
um cordel de três irmãs
simpáticas e bonitas,
inteligentes e sãs,
porém elas são humildes,
não altaneiras nem vãs.

Moram numa ilha tranqüila
bem no meio da Bahia---
a que é de Todos os Santos--
nadando a periferia,
brincando e cantando estranhas
e aquáticas melodias.

Elas nadam nuas sempre--
assim descoberto o peito--
sem malícia, sem pudor,
naturais, sem preconceito,
porque estas irmãs são iaras.
Vivem nuas desse jeito!

Moqueca é a irmã mais velha.
Alta, negra, responsável,
toma conta da família,
mantém a harmonia estável.
Quando acha oportunidades,
procura a recomendável.

A segunda é Mariscada.
Moreno tem o cabelo,
pele canela, olhos verdes,
e um balanço muito belo
pois nada contra a corrente
seguindo um sonho sem vê-lo.

A mais nova, ainda pequena,
de nome Macarronada,
é ruiva, baixa, gordinha.
Disposição animada
tem, pois em todo momento
atua precipitada.

Macarronada é produto
de outra família; é adotada.
Não é baiana; é mineira.
Tem a pronúncia alterada.
Mesmo assim ela faz canto
e com suas irmãs nada!

O caso é que resolveram
cuidar da Praia da Barra
protegendo-a de inimigos
de uma maneira bizarra,
pois vão ouvir como elas agem
segundo este cordel narra.

Foi numa noite de nuvens,
acesa a luz do farol,
o lampião quase visível
como faíscas de sol,
que apareceram dois barcos
da frota do rei espanhol.

As três irmãs, espreitando,
ouviram esta conversa:
"Estos brutos de Bahia
tienen su armada dispersa."
"Después de nuestro saqueo,
¡cómo quedará de adversa!"

"Ataque!" as iaras gritaram,
e agitaram as correntes
fazendo bater as caudas.
As águas ficaram quentes
e os madeiros dos navios
soltavam fumaça, ardentes.

Com raiva na água fervida,
fizeram-se cozinheiras.
Moqueca mudou de canto,
pediu favor das palmeiras
mandarem voando os cocos
pelas brisas passageiras.

Atingiram nos navios,
dando leite em goteirões.
Chamou os outros ingredientes:
cebolas e pimentões,
alho, azeite de dendê,
tomates e alguns limões.

Chegaram voando no ar
e cairam perto dela.
Então tudo misturou.
Fez da bahia panela,
e cozinhou quanto fruto
do mar que cabia nela.

Mas Mariscada achava ruim--
sacrifício insuportável--
deixar tanto peixe morto,
pois curtia o "sustentável."
Então com Macarronada
fez um plano formidável:

Magicamente teceram,
usando uns grandes novelos
feitos de uma coleção
familiar de seus cabelos,
uma rede limitando
a área desses bons apelos.

Assim ficaram presos
os espanhóis nos seus navios:
a zona interior fervia.
Protegidos pelos fios,
na zona exterior pulavam
peixes e animais sadios.

"¡Por Dios! ¡Nos están guisando!"
os marinheiros berraram.
Suando, desesperados,
rapidamente tiraram
casacos, camisas, calças
até despidos ficaram.

As iaras os viram nus,
desarmados e perplexos.
Aí falou Macarronada:
"Os jeitos não são complexos.
A comida já está feita e
pro baile, ambos os sexos!"

Adotando aquela idéia,
lembraram dicas maternas:
morderam-se os rabos, jeito
de dar mudanças internas,
transformando o que é de peixe
numas belas e fortes pernas.

Convertidas em mulheres,
subiram nas caravelas
trazendo moqueca quente
numas mágicas tigelas.
Os homens, maravilhados,
não desistiram de vê-las.

De novo elas cantaram,
os guerreiros convidando
a comerem e dançarem
toda a noite, desfrutando
a festa náutica e nua,
o farol iluminando.

Os espanhóis aceitaram.
A festa foi um sucesso.
Foi mostrada a cortesia
naquele alegre congresso.
Quanto aos bons fins diplomáticos,
A nudez virou progresso!

Muitos fazem homenagem
à mensagem dessa lenda.
Com apreço se reúnem
a fazer da nudez, senda
da humanidade instruída
a ver o mundo sem venda.

Por isso é que o dia de hoje,
quando vem alguém à praia
dançar e comer ao sol
sem sunga, tanga, nem saia,
deve ter zona marcada,
todos respeitando a raia!

El oratáculo

Anduvo por el desierto
los cuarenta y tres días
con su unánime noche.
Supo lo que es la intimidad con los escarabajos,
el convivio con las lagartijas,
el comerse las agrias ansias
y volver bien redondas las dudas
de tanto reciclarlas.
Deambuló por ambos lados de la frontera
de la lucidez.

Y ahora, en extremos de fertilidad desatada,
chorrea disparates que envuelven--
de manera ya cotidiana--
alguna que otra profecía.
Está como nublado, obnubilado,
emitiendo un perpetuo chipichipi
de nostalgias hipotéticas
y fantasías cimentadas
cuando rederrepente se despeja,
se escucha el acorde sostenido y triunfante
de un coro angelical,
y estalla de su rostro iluminado la expresión
inconfundible pero instantánea
de la Verdad,
para luego seguir ensartando
otras sandeces insospechadas.
Entre azul y buenas noches,
cuando no es orate, es oráculo.

Acaso viene siendo lo mismo.

Europe Syrup

There's a kind of a sticky-sweet pap that pervades Latin American cultural discourse: a syncretic residue, patina of questionable glories, that many accept at face value. It is a treacle preferred worldwide, and its main ingredient is Eurocentrism.

A majority of us in the Americas speak and write European languages, but try as Neruda might to declare that the barbarism of the Spanish conquest was forgiven by the wondrous gift of the Castilian language, European languages merely replaced indigenous ones. Many of these were already quite complex, and although they did not have, at the time of European contact, the chirographic and even typographical advances that some of the European languages had so recently developed themselves, they were rich in other ways, including synesthetic picture writing in Mesoamerica, and the tactile essence of the Andean quipus as well as the stelae of several cultures. In the case of Nheengatu, the língua geral of colonial Brazil, the vocabulary of an indigenous language (Tupinambá) was grafted onto the syntax of a European one (Portuguese). The happily wed pidgin functioned fine, far and wide, over several centuries and is still spoken today.

It is telling that nouns are the part of speech in which the indigenous languages most greatly enriched the European ones. Flora, fauna, and objects unfamiliar to the Europeans were either assimilated via their indigenous signifieds (often mispronounced or "adapted" to European pronunciations) or misnamed to fit European experience (i.e. tigre for jaguar). But verbs, as in ways of doing and being and thinking? Precious few. And yet certain cultural practices and cognitive processes persist in the Americas, evident in behavioral preferences. For example, why does traditional Mexican pedagogy continue to focus so intensely on penmanship, to the detriment of content, in the instruction of writing skills? Perhaps it is the result of a double legacy: the Mexica tlacuilos--scribes whose job was to copy words as objects, not produce new sequences of them--and the colonial New Spanish Catholic focus on teaching Latin, more than Castilian, as a language already set in stone, a language to memorize in inalterable prayers.

Inquisitorial proscriptions (among other factors) delayed the establishment of printing presses in the Iberian colonies.Yet in the Lusophone world today, Brazil dominates the publishing industry as well as film and television production. Huge and powerful Brazil is the "gigante acordado"; however, in the Spanish-speaking world, the majority of the main publishers are now Spanish-owned, despite strong growth in the publishing industries of Mexico, Argentina, and Chile in the late 20th century. Nonetheless, this imbalance pertains only to print. The Spanish American countries, and Brazil, compete very well with Spain and other countries in terms of television and film output. Such video productions often aim to promote, say, Mexican tourism or Brazilian landscapes, foregrounding contemporary interpretations of the autochthonous for viewers both domestic and foreign.

It is perhaps surprising that so many manifestations of autochthonous lifeways survived the Iberian invasions. But I find it more surprising that there still exists, in the 21st century, so much deference to Europe. European writers, especially theorists and philosophers but even creative writers, continue to be more widely studied in Latin America than their homegrown counterparts. But those European theorists and thinkers have so much to say, and they've said it so well, and produced so much over a longer period of time in the language, and it's so widely discussed!, one might object. Well, one thing leads to another, doesn't it? I would suggest that the underlying assumption is that certain kinds of thinking don't happen outside Europe or the Anglo West. As much as we like to think about how the expressions of a given language can shape (and thus limit) thought in that language, to assert that philosophy has not and cannot be expressed in a non-European language is absurd. The challenge is to not just take for granted that philosophy is all about the Germans or the French.

In Larry Baxter's novel The Mayan Glyph, the cure for an unknown epidemic hinges on the deciphering of classic-era Mayan glyphs that show that at least one Mayan scientist was on the track of the periodic table of the elements. The visual design of his discovery had been expressed in a way unfamiliar to Western convention. The premise is fictitious though not implausible, given how much we know about Mayan advances in math and astronomy. One wonders just how much can be recovered, or rediscovered, regarding American indigenous and also African attainments in the various fields of knowledge, including definitions of (or variations on) epistemology itself. It all comes down to language: visual, oral, even tactile.

Hold the syrup.

Cumbia del calambre

Yo tengo mal de amores, caray,
y me tiembla todo el cuerpo.
Por eso fui al consultorio
 y así me dijo el médico:
"Con esa calentura que tienes,
muchacho, que para curarte,
hay que bailar la cumbia,
¡la cumbia del calambre!"

Esos ojazos que tiene mi amor
me taladraron el pecho.
Por eso me recetaron así
cuando fui con el curandero:
"Con esa presión alta que tienes,
muchacho, que para curarte,
hay que bailar la cumbia,
¡la cumbia del calambre!"

Baliando con ella me siento feliz.
La tengo conmigo y la estrecho.
Por eso todos me dicen lo mismo
que no existe otro remedio:
"Con esa comezón fuerte que tienes,
muchacho, que para curarte,
hay que bailar la cumbia,
¡la cumbia del calambre!"

seis sóis

seis sóis de seis céus

coleção que são

coleção colagem

alguns mexicanos

outros estadunidenses

mais um dominicano

mas no mosaico

mais universais

vários sorrisos

só um sem raios
tem de metal, de barro, de vidro
naturais, pintados, até transparente

todos capturados

pela minha câmara

em dias de sol

quanto sol neste verão

quantos sóis verão?

seis sóis sós

cada sol no seio do seu céu

Echoes of Nezahualcoyotl

A Brief Commentary on “Tezcotzinco” by Alan Seeger

Though thou art now a ruin bare and cold,
Thou wert sometime the garden of a king.
The birds have sought a lovelier place to sing.
The flowers are few. It was not so of old.

It was not thus when hand in hand there strolled
Through arbors perfumed with undying Spring
Bare bodies beautiful, brown, glistening,
Decked with green plumes and rings of yellow gold.

Do you suppose the herdsman sometimes hears
Vague echoes borne beneath the moon’s pale ray
From those old, old, far-off, forgotten years?

Who knows? Here where his ancient kings held sway
He stands. Their names are strangers to his ears.
Even their memory has passed away.

Alan Seeger (1888, United States-1916, France), a poet and soldier who died in battle in WWI, is perhaps best known for his poem “I Have a Rendezvous with Death.” Seeger spent part of his youth in Mexico and decided to write about Tezcotzinco, the park and spa designed by 15th-century tlatoani Nezahualcoyotl for his own use, not far from his palace in Texcoco (present-day Mexico state). Maybe Seeger felt an affinity with Nezahualcoyotl, a fellow poet. Chapultepec Park in Mexico City, also originally designed by Nezahualcoyotl, is infinitely more utilized as an actual park, but I have a feeling that the Tezcotzinco park area is not as abandoned or forgotten today as Seeger’s poetic voice suggests. Nonetheless, the sonnet is a finely wrought treatment of the ubi sunt theme in a Mesoamerican setting.

The first quatrain, in spite of the elevated register, and in spite of referring to the garden that the ruin once was, consists of short phrases that describe the ruin’s absence of life and movement. In contrast, the second quatrain, evoking the garden of old, is one long, lush phrase. It is linked to the end of the previous quatrain through the anaphora “It was not,” but it is much more extensive, and suggestive of a Garden of Eden. Colors abound (brown, green, and the pleonasm “yellow gold”), with ornamentation, perfume, and movement (the “bare bodies” stroll and glisten). For extra measure, Seeger bestows on “Spring” the modifier “undying,” an ironic choice given the poem’s theme and conclusion.

True to form, the tercets restate the theme, in this case through a question and a two-part answer: (1) the quick rhetorical question “Who knows?” and (2) the rest of the final verses, characterized by a return to short, sparse statements like those in the opening quatrain. The poetic voice contrasts the second quatrain’s communality of “bodies,” “arbors,” “plumes” and “rings” with the tercet’s solitary figure of the herdsman. The herdsman’s lonely occupation echoes the first quatrain’s ambiance of loneliness, even though the hypothetical “echoes” in the question refer to the glory years of activity in the garden. The correspondence is highlighted by alliteration: the “h”s and “b”s of “herdsman sometimes hears / Vague echoes borne beneath” effectively echo the “h”s and “b”s of “hand in hand” and “Bare bodies, beautiful, brown” in the second quatrain. Another solitary figure in the tercet is the moon, whose “pale” (and singular) "ray" contrasts with the rich colors of the second quatrain.

And in the final verses, the herdsman “stands,” fixed like a column among the ruins, in opposition to the movement of the strolling bodies earlier. The verb “stands” also plays off the word “sway” at the end of the previous verse; the kings “held sway” or controlled motion, but the herdsman merely stands. The questioned echoes from the first tercet dissipate here into unrecognizable “names” and then “Even their memory has passed away,” an allusion to an ultimate death as the unremembered and unknown. This reinforces the “old, old, far-off, forgotten years” at the end of the first tercet, and also recalls a trope frequently employed in this kind of sonnet: nouns of diminishing substance that, together with the short phrases and the loss of words’ substance (visual as well as aural) at the end of the poem, conjure the death itself.

A gem of a sonnet, but fortunately the ubi sunt theme is overstated here. Seeger composed the poem before the victors of the Mexican Revolution began an official revindication of indigenous cultures as part of a renewed national identity, supporting Vasconcelos’s La raza cósmica; the murals of Rivera, Orozco, and Siqueiros; the color and symbolism of Kahlo and Tamayo; and many other manifestations, culminating perhaps in the monolithic construction of the Museo Nacional de Antropología. Here are some terrific photos, by the highly creative visual artist Bernard Perroud on his outstanding blog, of the park at Tezcotzinco and of the structure known as Nezahualcoyotl’s bath. Long live the memory of Tezcotzinco!

Café con piernas

¿Qué cosa es café con piernas?

Escondido tras vidrio ahumado,
un local de misterio donde apenas
se vislumbran unas piernas
esbeltas
que pasean,
desarticuladas,
por la única banda de transparencia
en la fachada.
Venga y pruebe una taza de sabrosa sinécdoque
con leche, con azúcar, con piernas de mujer.

¿Quiere Ud. un descanso, caballero?
Aquí hay reposo y ambiente
acogedor
para refrescar la sed de la mirada.
Aquí no tienen precio las carnes,
propiamente,
pero, eso sí, tienen aprecio.
No están a la venta,
sino a la vista.
Venga y pruebe una taza de sabrosa sinécdoque
con azúcar, con piernas, con leche de mujer.

¿Quién se entera de que Ud. está aquí?
Sus compañeros clientes,
y más nadie.
Aquí tapamos rostros para que no vean los peatones,
pero hay mucho más que está bien
destapado.
Entre santiaguinos y turistas,
el frecuentador y el explorador,
abrimos otro hueco en el mostrador.
Venga y pruebe una taza de sabrosa sinécdoque
con piernas, con leche, con azúcar de mujer.

Amazonas: Saudades de um Restaurante Brasileiro

Ah, as saudades que tenho dessa época da minha vida! Sendo aluno pos-graduado em literatura latino-americana na Universidade de Virginia, lá pelo meio da década dos noventa, decidi trabalhar de garçom em um dos três restaurantes brasileiros que houve então na pequena cidade de Charlottesville. Eram os restaurantes ABC: Amazonas, Brasil-Brazil, e Copacabana.

Eis o caso que essa área do estado de Virginia recebera uma grande porção da muito comentada emigração da cidade de Governador Valadares, no estado brasileiro de Minas Gerais. Então os donos desses três restaurantes, mais o dono de um restaurante italiano, representavam, localmente, essa diáspora em particular. No caso do Amazonas, a cozinheira era que tinha chegado de GV em Minas. O namorado dela, peruano da região amazônica (Iquitos), era o dono e pôs o nome do restuarante, mesmo que a comida tinha tendência muito mais mineira e baiana do que amazônica!

Foi, agora entendo, um trabalho ideal para mim nesse momento, porque me ofereceu a oportunidade de praticar constantemente não só o português e o espanhol falados, mas também a contínua mudança entre eles. O dono e eu éramos os únicos que falávamos os três idiomas bem. Num procedimento típico, eu tomava a ordem em inglês, passava pela área de pratos e colheres e garfos etc. falando com os outros garçons em espanhol, e dava a ordem na cozinha em português. Muito embora, também era normal ter freguês hispano-falante, ou mesmo luso-falante de vez em quando. Houve também garçons brasileiros, e garçons americanos que expressavam-se só em inglês.

Mas o grande desafio para mim era manter separados estes dois idiomas ibéricos transplantados. Observava, com fascinação lingüística, como era que a cozinheira e o assistente dela, mexicano de Jalisco, falavam-se no calor do momento e às pressas um estranho portunhol, feito sempre ou de cognados culinários mutuamente compreensíveis ("pão" e "pan," "cebola" e "cebolla") ou da opção, de entre as duas línguas, que oferecia menos sílabas: "faca" mas não "cuchillo," "piña" e não "abacaxi"!

E em aquele ambiente bem bohêmio de muros de estuco decorados com artesanatos peruanos, eu também absorvia a MPB (música popular brasileira) que sempre ouvia-se no restaurante (sobretudo a coleção Brazil Classics compilada por David Byrne); experimentava a excelente comida da cozinheira: feijoada, moqueca, mariscada, macarronada, quindim, etc. e tal; aprendi a preparar caipiroskas (ou seja com vodka, e não caipirinhas, porque a venta da cachaça era prohibida pelo governo estatal!); e mais que nada, fiz amizades e vivi belos momentos, mesmo quando berrava algum freguês chateado!

Defeñeces

Un pequeño retablo de la vida cotidiana en el DF y Satélite, tomadas 15-18 julio 2010.

Una lotería mesoamericana

En el tradicional juego de la lotería mexicana, el que "canta" las figuras lo que hace primero es dar una descripción o metáfora de ellas conforme aparecen seleccionadas, incluyendo el nombre después si hace falta. Así, por ejemplo: "El abrigo de los pobres... ¡el sol! El que saluda al amanecer... ¡el gallo!"

Ofrezco a seguir metáforas o descripciones para poder "cantar" los íconos prehispánicos pintados en la imagen de esta artesanía que conseguí en Tuxtla Gutiérrez, Chiapas. Originalmente fue calendario, pero como ya se acabó aquel año, escondí esa parte de la tela, ¡y ahora parece más bien tablero de lotería! Muchas de las descripciones o metáforas aluden a la cosmología mesoamericana, por lo que incluyo aquí los nombres de los animales en uno de los idiomas mesoamericanos: el náhuatl.

El alma del guerrero                                    (el colibrí / huitzilin)
La base de la tierra                                     (la tortuga / ayotli)
El retrato en la luna                                     (el conejo / tochtli)
El hijo de los hombres de palo                    (el mono / ozomatli)
El que se paró en el nopal                           (el águila / cuauhtli)
La mascota comestible                                (el perro / izcuintle)
El que por poder hablar, no deja de mentir  (el perico / queletzu)
La madre que lleva a sus crías en un bolsón (el tlacuache / tlacuatzin)
El relámpago envenenado                            (la serpiente / coatl)
El bufón hocicón                                         (el tejón / pezotli)
El baile de los yaquis                                   (el venado / mazatl)
El cacaotero que fecundó la tierra                (el lagarto / cipactli)
El cazador bajito que grita alto                     (la comadreja / cozamatl)
El león de las montañas                               (la puma / miztli)
El plumaje precioso                                     (el quetzal / quetzalli)
El que ilumina la noche con sus ojos             (el jaguar / ocelotl)

El don de la palabra

The word don in Spanish is an honorary title for men, as in Don Felipe or Don José or Cervantes's Don Quixote. The women's equivalent is doña. But don also means a special gift or talent, as in the phrase don de gente to describe a "people" person like Bill Clinton, or don de la palabra, sometimes translated as the "gift of gab" but more like the gift of being well spoken and expressive.

Don Pablo Ramírez, "La Torre de Jalisco," is someone who definitely has el don de la palabra. Jalisco, Mexico-born Ramírez, a long-time resident of the Univisión channel's República Deportiva, is one of the comentaristas for the World Cup soccer games. Listening to the games in English is, frankly, listless and clinical. Listening to them in Spanish on Univisión is just as analytical but much more fun, and not only because of don Pablo's famous phrase "gol. [big breath] ¡¡¡GOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOL GOL GOL GOL GOL GOL AZO AZO AZO GOLAZO GOLAZO!!!"

I've had memorable communal experiences watching World Cup games in Mexico (1990, 1998, 2002) and Spain (1994): listening to verbose TV commentators and bombastic viewers gathered in hotel lobbies, corner bars, restaurants, or private residences, with beer or coffee (depending on the hour of the day) flowing in abundance. Here in the States, don Pablo exemplifies soccer commentary in the Spanish and Portuguese-language tradition, with a penchant for witty phrases and intriguing imagery. For example, at one point in a recent game in this 2010 edition of the World Cup, to describe a failed head-butt attempt for what would have been the team's third goal, don Pablo elaborated the following metaphor: "¡IBA a meter el tercer CLAVO al ataúd! ¡Pero no sacó el MARTILLO a tiempo!" meaning that the player was going to put the third nail (goal) in the coffin (the other team was losing) but he didn't get out the hammer (his head) in time!


Describing a beautiful Brazilian goal exemplifying that nation's jogo bonito tradition, he enthused, "¿Quién DICE que para apreciar una obra de ARTE tienes que ir al museo o al teatro? AQUI estamos VIENDO que nomás hace falta un balón y un BUEN jugador!" (Who says you have to go to a museum or theater to appreciate a work of art? Here we're seeing that you only need a ball and a good player!) You want literary allusion? Praising a formidable goalie, he compared him to "el Can Cerberos," or Cerberus, the three-headed canine guardian of Hades, while discreetly explaining the mythological reference "cortesía de Univisión." He frequently takes the name of his colleague, "El Profe" Bracamontes, "in vain" to dramatically invite his opinion, yelling "¡Háblame Jesús!" which means "Speak to me, Jesus (Bracamontes)!"

One more masterful example: After a ¡GOOOOOOOOOOL!, don Pablo added "¡¡¡LO COLOCO LO COLOCO LOCOLOCOLOCOLOCO!!!" This is a terrific play on words which, slightly altering the G of GOL to a C, takes on at least three meanings: "lo colocó" (he placed it), "lo coló" (he slid it in), and of course "loco."(I don't remember which game this was, but if it was a goal made by the Chilean team, then there would be a fourth meaning as well: Colo-Colo, Chile's best known soccer club, from which several of the national team players come.)

Sin DUDA los comentarios de DON PABLO hacen mucho más ALEGRE el juego, ¡hasta el partido más DESABRIDO!

Flush

Slick

                                    Slick   

                                                                        Slick

Dispersants.

The Gulf is so big.

Slick

                                    Slick   

                                                                        Slick

Crustaceans.

The shrimp are so small.

The encabpsulated drobps of bpetroleum add ubp

bpeyond where anybpody can count.

Blackened fish? Fish oil?

This is not what the health guides mean.

Pelicans gulping

for air / not fish.

Dolphins diving

for clear water / not fish.

This mess is so huge and so smelly and so dirty

that the only plumber who can

flush this bowl

is the ancient one-legged storm-bringer,

pan-Caribbean creator / destructor

Hurakán.

Natural solution / divine intervention

to a manmade problem.

What will happen then?

Slick

                                    Slick   

                                                                        Slick

Dispersal:

Drobplets encabpsulating Houston.

Drobplets encabpsulating Atlanta.

Drobplets encabpsulating Washington.

And at least a few little drobplets sent

along the Gulf Stream

to London.

Hurakán can see to that.

figa

salsa verde

salsa verde
marca Hérdez
me enloquece
me enverdece

tomatillos
y serranos
con cebolla
y cilantro

en huevos, grits,
y frijoles
con totopos
o tostones

enchiladas
suizas de la
salsa verde
son las reinas

si tú quieres
conocerla
cómprate la
marca Hérdez

se desaguan
otras salsas
demasiado
escurridizas
liquidadas

otras marcas
de repente
tienen muchos pedazos
que atropellan el ritmo del sabor

salsa verde
marca Hérdez
me enloquece
me enverdece