If you've seen a mount of sea foam,
It is my verse you have seen:
My verse a mountain has been
And a feathered fan become.
My verse is like a dagger
At whose hilt a flower grows:
My verse is a fount which flows
With a sparkling coral water.
My verse is a gentle green
And also a flaming red:
My verse is a deer wounded
Seeking forest cover unseen.
My verse is brief and sincere,
And to the brave will appeal:
With all the strength of the steel
With which the sword will appear.
SI VES UN MONTE DE ESPUMAS... (Verso V)
Si ves un monte de espumas,
Es mi verso lo que ves,
Mi verso es un monte, y es
Un abanico de plumas.
Mi verso es como un puñal
Que por el puño echa flor:
Mi verso es un surtidor
Que da un agua de coral.
Mi verso es de un verde claro
Y de un carmín encendido:
Mi verso es un ciervo herido
Que busca en el monte amparo.
Mi verso al valiente agrada:
Mi verso, breve y sincero,
Es del vigor del acero
Conque se funde la espada.
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I heard Pete Seeger's Guantanamera... and was trying to understand the lines. If a poem about his poetry can be so beautiful, I can only imagine what wonders his work would hold!
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Hello, Kristen: This is one of Jose Marti's most famous and universal poems. It is known in the U.S. through Pete Seeger's rendition of the classic Cuban folk song "Guantanamera," which consists of excerpts from Marti's "Versos Sencillos/Simple Verses" (including the 2nd and 3rd stanzas of this particular poem). In Verse V, Marti attempts to describe the texture, the content and the purpose of his poetry through a rapid series of metaphors. In the first stanza, he compares his poetry to a mountain of sea foam, that is, to something which is at once permanent and ephemeral; but, above all, a force that springs from Nature and can be as potent or as fragile as Nature herself. His poetry (or "verse," as he calls it) has a wonderful ability to transform itself to conform to the demands of the moment: hence when love calls, it can become a "feathered fan;" or when country or honor beckon, it can become a dagger, albeit one from "whose hilt a flower grows." (The gun with a flower sticking out of the barrel, which became a common image during the Vietnam War, is a direct descendent of this metaphor). What Marti means, however, is that forgiveness is the product of justice redeemed; without justice having been first done, there can be no generosity or pardon. In the 2nd stanza, Marti also compares his poetry to fountain from which flows "sparkling coral water." Water, of course, is the essence of life; his poetry, then, is infused with the essence of life and with the purity of water. In the third stanza, Marti affirms that his poetry is "a gentle green and also a flaming red." I think that these are precisely the two colors of poetry -- not only Marti's, but everybody's poetry: the green sap of Nature and the red blood of Man. Next he compares his poetry -- but he's actually speaking of himself -- to "a wounded deer seeking forest cover unseen." Here it might be useful to introduce a little of Marti's own personal history. From adolescence Jose Marti devoted his life to the liberation of his country from Spanish colonial rule: At 15 years of age, he was charged with treason and sentenced to hard labor at a stone quarry; at 17, he was deported from his country; at 25, he availed himself of an amnesty and was again imprisoned and deported. Marti lived in exile for the remainder of his life, relentlessly spied upon and pursued by Spanish agents, who on one occasion tried to poison him and on another to stab him; all the while, he was suffering from the TB he had contracted in prison as a boy. Finally, at age 42, Marti died in one of the first battles of the revolution he had organized to secure his country's independence. Such a man may well feel like a wounded deer who seeks refuge in the forest (Nature, poetry). The final stanza describes his poetry as "brief and sincere" and says that it will appeal to the "brave" (those who will help him to liberate his country) because it is made of the same steel as the sword that will redeem his country. So there you have the ingredients of Marti's poetry as delineated by himself: mountain (solidity); sea foam (temporality); feathered fan (love); dagger (justice); flower (forgiveness); water fountain (purity); green (Nature); red (Man); deer (martyrdom); sword (freedom); steel (courage). I strongly urge you to read "Pour Out Your Sorrows, My Heart" (Verse XLVI), which is Marti's love poem to poetry: "I love you, Verse, my friend true,//Because when in pieces torn//My heart's too burdened, you've borne//All my sorrows upon you.//
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what does this mean?
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