Alguna vez Inti Illimani estuvo en El Bronx y Quilapayún en Town Hall (records by Patricia Pottlitzer)

DESCRIPTION OF CONTENTS OF SAMPLE VIDEOTAPE #2

00' 1. Inti-Illimani, Chilean singing group who was touring Europe at the time of the coup, in concert at Hostos Community College, Bronx, New York, October 1974.

03' 2. Quilapayún, Chilean singing group who, like Inti-Illimani, were leaders in the New Chilean Song Movement (La nueva canción chilena) and were in Europe at the time of the coup, in concert at Town Hall, March 1975.

05' 26 seconds of blank tape

06' 3. Members of Quilapayún watching a video of Víctor Jara singing. Jara helped the Quilapayún get started and sang with them for a few years. Taped in Macrh 1975.

07' 4. Members of Quilapayún talking about New Chilean Song Movement.

The prayer, Plegaria a un labrador, by Víctor Jara translated into English by Joanne Pottlitzer

Stand up
Look at the mountains
source of the wind and the sun and the water
you who direct their course
you who sowed the flight of your soul

Stand up
Look at your hands
Extend them to your brother so you can grow
Together we can go, united in blood
The future can begin today

Deliver us from that which keeps us in misery
Bring us your kingdom of justice and equality
Blow like the wind the flowers of the valley
Clean like fire the cannon of my gun

Make your will be done at last on earth
Give us your strength and your courage as we fight.
Blow the valley flower like the wind
Clean like fire the cannon of my gun like fire

Stand up
Look at your hands
Extend them to your brother so you can grow
Together we go, united in blood
Now and at the hour of our death, amen

Mad Girl's Love Song, Poem By Sylvia Plath

"I shut my eyes and all the world drops dead;
I lift my lids and all is born again.
(I think I made you up inside my head.)

The stars go waltzing out in blue and red,
And arbitrary blackness gallops in:
I shut my eyes and all the world drops dead.

I dreamed that you bewitched me into bed
And sung me moon-struck, kissed me quite insane.
(I think I made you up inside my head.)

God topples from the sky, hell's fires fade:
Exit seraphim and Satan's men:
I shut my eyes and all the world drops dead.

I fancied you'd return the way you said,
But I grow old and I forget your name.
(I think I made you up inside my head.)

I should have loved a thunderbird instead;
At least when spring comes they roar back again.
I shut my eyes and all the world drops dead.
(I think I made you up inside my head.)"

 

«Canción de amor de la joven loca»

Cierro los ojos y el mundo muere;
Levanto los párpados y nace todo nuevamente.
(Creo que te inventé en mi mente).

Las estrellas salen valseando en azul y rojo,
Y arbitraria ingresa galopando la negrura:
Cierro los ojos y el mundo muere.

Soñé que me hechizabas en la cama
Cantabas el sonido de la luna, me besabas locamente.
(Creo que te inventé en mi mente).

Dios cae del cielo, las llamas del infierno se evaporan:
Escapan serafines y soldados de Satán:
Cierro los ojos y el mundo muere.

Imaginé que volverías como dijiste,
Pero envejezco y olvidé tu nombre.
(Creo que te inventé en mi mente).

Debí haber amado al pájaro de trueno, no a ti;
Al menos cuando llega la primavera ruge otra vez.
Cierro los ojos y el mundo muere.
(Creo que te inventé en mi mente).

 

Poem by Jon Walker (King of Kodak) translated by Arelis Uribe

 

 

 

donde el yo caes
y tú es poco importante

en secuencia temporal
o espacio o impresión

viste cómo estuve a punto
de menearme como un imposible
valle de girasoles
en el sentir de ti
y tu mirada

quizá comenzando por ahí
pero prefiero pensar que no

(mis girasoles y tu mirada)
una inmediación entre ambos
llamada impacientemente al momento

he esperado todo este tiempo para

reunir solo una vez (no hay suficientes)
esa silenciosa catedral de verano adorablemente

en una pieza y frotar el polen
entre mis dedos que algún

día podría del todo desaparecer
(mis girasoles, tu mirada) algo
sabría

tan intimamente como para olvidarlo jamás

Sólo para decirte (William Carlos Williams)

Sólo para decirte
que me comí
las ciruelas
que estaban en
la heladera

y que
probablemente
guardabas
para el desayuno

Perdóname
estaban deliciosas
tan dulces
tan frías

"Eat, Pray, Love", Elizabeth Gilbert

Of course, I’ve had a lot of time to formulate my opinions about divinity since that night on the bathroom floor when I spoke to God directly for the first time. In the middle of that dark November crisis, though, I was not interested in formulating my views on theology. I was interested only in saving my life. I had finally noticed that I seemed to have reached a state of hopeless and life-threatening despair, and it occurred to me that sometimes people in this state will approach God for help. I think I’d read that in a book somewhere. What I said to God through my gasping sobs was something like this: “Hello, God. How are you? I’m Liz. It’s nice to meet you.” That’s right—I was speaking to the creator of the universe as though we’d just been introduced at a cocktail party. But we work with what we know in this life, and these are the words I always use at the beginning of a relationship. In fact, it was all I could do to stop myself from saying, “I’ve always been a big fan of your work . . .” “I’m sorry to bother you so late at night,” I continued. “But I’m in serious trouble. And I’m sorry I haven’t ever spoken directly to you before, but I do hope I have always expressed ample gratitude for all the blessings that you’ve given me in my life.” This thought caused me to sob even harder. God waited me out. I pulled myself together enough to go on: “I am not an expert at praying, as you know. But can you please help me? I am in desperate need of help. I don’t know what to do. I need an answer. Please tell me what to do. Please tell me what to do. Please tell me what to do . . .” And so the prayer narrowed itself down to that simple entreaty—Please tell me what to do—repeated again and again. I don’t know how many times I begged. I only know that I begged like someone who was pleading for her life. And the crying went on forever. Until—quite abruptly—it stopped. Quite abruptly, I found that I was not crying anymore. I’d stopped crying, in fact, in midsob. My misery had been completely vacuumed out of me. I lifted my forehead off the floor and sat up in surprise, wondering if I would see now some Great Being who had taken my weeping away. But nobody was there. I was just alone. But not really alone, either. I was surrounded by something I can only describe as a little pocket of silence—a silence so rare that I didn’t want to exhale, for fear of scaring it off. I was seamlessly still. I don’t know when I’d ever felt such stillness. Then I heard a voice. Please don’t be alarmed—it was not an Old Testament Hollywood Charlton Heston voice, nor was it a voice telling me I must build a baseball field in my backyard. It was merely my own voice, speaking from within my own self. But this was my voice as I had never heard it before. This was my voice, but perfectly wise, calm and compassionate. This was what my voice would sound like if I’d only ever experienced love and certainty in my life. How can I describe the warmth of affection in that voice, as it gave me the answer that would forever seal my faith in the divine? The voice said: Go back to bed, Liz. I exhaled. It was so immediately clear that this was the only thing to do.

Anne Waldman

Daddy, by Sylvia Plath

American Sonnet for the New Year, by Terrance Hayes

things got terribly ugly incredibly quickly
things got ugly embarrassingly quickly
actually things got ugly unbelievably quickly
honestly things got ugly seemingly infrequently
initially things got ugly ironically usually
awfully carefully things got ugly unsuccessfully
occasionally things got ugly mostly painstakingly
quietly seemingly things got ugly beautifully
infrequently things got ugly sadly especially
frequently unfortunately things got ugly
increasingly obviously things got ugly suddenly
embarrassingly forcefully things got really ugly
regularly truly quickly things got really incredibly
ugly things will get less ugly inevitably hopefully

Poemas de Sharon Olds en español

War

1. Woman with the Lettuce

They are crowded in a line being shoved toward a truck.

Some seem stunned, some sick with fear.

She stands slightly outside the line,

black hat clamped on her head,

mouth compressed. In her hands she holds

an oversized lettuce, its white stems and

great, pale, veined leaves

unfolded in the dense air. She stares

directly at the camera, the large, delicate

plant in her grip, its glowing vanes

reaching out. Furious, she takes her

last chance to look right at us.

Guerra

1. Mujer con lechuga

Apiñados en fila los empujan hacia un camión.

Unos parecen pasmados, otros muertos de miedo.

Ella se sale un poco de la fila,

el sombrero negro firme en la cabeza,

la boca apretada. En las manos sostiene

una enorme lechuga, blancos sus tallos y

magníficas, pálidas, venosas sus hojas

desplegadas en el aire denso. Ella mira

directamente a la cámara, la gran, delicada

planta en su poder, sus aspas brillantes

estirándose. Furiosa, aprovecha su

última chance de dirigirnos la mirada.

2. Legless Fighter Pilot

He takes his right calf in his hand,

lifts the whole leg up, straight,

turns, and swings it into the cockpit,

sliding into the seat. The left leg he

bends by hand at the knee, pulls it in, and

slams the hatch, then in his aircraft

he rises over the hills. In the sky

no one can walk, everyone

is a sitting duck, he banks and begins to hunt.

He is not afraid of anything now,

not even his coffin —hell, he is part

native oak already, and if he

lost his arms he’d replace them. All he

wants is to bag as many as he can,

crash them into the ground like birds into a sack with their

useless legs trailing out the mouth of it.

2. Piloto de guerra sin piernas

Agarra su pantorrilla derecha en la mano,

levanta toda la pierna, recta,

gira, y la arroja a la cabina,

se desliza en el asiento. La pierna izquierda

la dobla por la rodilla con la mano, la jala, y

cierra la ventanilla, ya en su aeronave,

asciende sobre las colinas. En el cielo

nadie puede caminar, cualquiera

es una presa fácil, ladeándose empieza a cazar.

No le teme a nada ahora,

ni siquiera a su ataúd —mierda, en parte

ya es roble nativo, y si perdiera

los brazos los reemplazaría. Lo único que

quiere es cargarse tantas como pueda,

aplastarlas contra el suelo como pájaros en un saco con las

piernas inútiles desparramándose por la boca.

3. What Could Happen

When the men and women went into hiding,

they knew what could happen if the others caught them.

They knew their bodies might be undone,

their sexual organs taken as if

to destroy the mold so the human could not

be made anymore. They knew what the others

went for—the center of the body,

and not just for the agony and horror but to

send them crudely barren into death,

throwing those bodies down in the village at dawn

to show that all was ended. But each

time the others dumped a body in the square,

a few more people took to the woods,

as if spring up, there,

from the loam dark as the body’s wound.

3. Lo que podría pasar

Cuando los hombres y mujeres fueron a esconderse,

sabían lo que podría pasar si los otros los atrapaban.

Sabían que sus cuerpos podían ser deshechos,

sus órganos sexuales secuestrados como

para destruir el molde y que el humano no pudiera

ser hecho nunca más. Sabían lo que los otros

fueron a buscar—el centro del cuerpo,

y no sólo por la agonía y el horror sino para

enviarles crudamente estériles a la muerte,

arrojando esos cuerpos en el pueblo al amanecer

para mostrar que todo había terminado. Pero cada

vez que los otros botaban un cuerpo en la plaza,

otros pocos más se iban a los bosques,

como floreciendo, allí,

desde la arcilla oscura y desde la herida del cuerpo.

*Poemas traducidos por Arelis Uribe en un taller de poesía y traducción de NYU.