"Rest my solitary bed
In the forest of forgotten men,
In the shade of a cross, and write upon it:
- He was a poet, he dreamed and he loved in life."
("Remembrance of Death")
We can find Álvares de Azevedo's work within the second phase of Romantic poetry in Brazil; therefore, in Ultra-Romanticism, also known as Byronism.
And although the poet died extremely young, at twenty years old, he can be supremely considered the most important writer of his time. All his work was published posthumously (A Lira dos Vinte anos (1853), Noite na Taverna, tales (1855), and Macário, theatre (1855)).
A Lira dos Vinte Anos
A Lira dos Vinte Anos comprises the best of Álvares de Azevedo's production. Structurally, it is divided into three parts; but from a thematic point of view, into only two. Why?
The first and third parts have similar themes: death, family, themes of adolescence, dreams, religiosity, the female form as an obsession; the second part, however, brings the ironic, the "satanic," the woman, even in dreams, approached through the erotic, carnal.
Part I
Composed of 33 poems, it begins with a preface bearing a suggestive epithet from Bocage:
"Singing life, as the swan sings death."
The poet warns us:
"These are the first songs of a poor poet. Forgive them. The first calls of the thrush do not have the sweetness of its love songs.
It is a lyre, but without strings; a spring, but without flowers; a crown of leaves, but without freshness.
Spontaneous songs of the heart, painful vibrations of the internal lyre that stirred a dream, notes that the wind carried away - like these, I bring these harmonies to light.
These are the torn pages of an unread book... (...)"
The first part of the Lyre contains poems whose theme is intimate: pains of the heart, fear of death, the woman who sometimes appears and sometimes hides, family, dreams and fantasy that blend, mainly through metaphorical play in the eroticization of women. In this part, symbols emerge that hint at repressed sexuality.
Observe some texts:
At Sea
It was night - you were sleeping,
In the melodies of dreams,
In the cool breeze;
Rocked in the felucca,
In the cold moonlight,
To the sighs of my heart!
Ah! What a veil of paleness
On your languid face!
How your heaving breasts
Palpitated in your sleep!
How I mused, kissing
Your loose dark hair!
Were you dreaming? - I was not sleeping;
My soul was drinking in
Your pensive soul!
And you trembled, beautiful lover,
At my kisses, like
The leaves of the sensitive plant! (frag.)
When at night in the perfumed bed
You recline your languid forehead in sleep,
In the vapor of illusion, why is your divine eyelid
Dewed with tears of love?
And when I contemplate you asleep
Your hair loose on the soft bed,
Why does a warm sigh resonate
And gently fade in your chest?
Virgin of my love, the stolen kiss
That I place on your sleeping face
Does it not remind your heart of my loves
And the fever of my life's dreams?
Sleep, O angel of love! In your silence
My chest drowns in tenderness
And I feel that the future is not worth a kiss
Nor heaven in your sigh of bliss! (...) (fragment)
The Poet
It was a night - I was sleeping
And in my dreams I relived
The illusions I dreamed!
And at my side I felt...
My God! Why didn't I die?
Why did I wake up in my sleep?
In my bed - asleep
Palpitating and dejected,
The lover of my love!
Her hair perfuming
Running over my face
Like moonlight on a flower!
I felt her fragrant chest
Breathing eagerly;
And on her lips, which I parted,
A languid breath,
A dream of the heart
That died sighing!
It was not a false dream;
My deluded heart
Felt it and did not dream:
And it felt itself lost
In a pain it did not know...
It didn't even kiss her!
(...)
And if I, trembling, madam,
Were to come pale now
To remind you of my dream,
With a pale forehead
And a choked voice
To tell you softly - It is I!
It is I! Who have not forgotten
The night I did not sleep,
That it was not an illusion!
It is I who feel dying
The hope of living...
That I feel it in my heart! - (frag.)
When I speak to you, my chest
Forgets this pain that consumes me:
Perhaps pleasure runs through the soul's fibers:
And I still dare to whisper your name!
What an existence, woman! If you knew
The heartache of your lover,
And the sighs that in the silence of the night,
Gasp in his delirious chest!
And how much he suffers and has suffered, and the fever
That has paled his lips in life,
And his soul tired in convulsive pain
And fell asleep in consumed ashes!
Perhaps you would pity the insane sorrow
That my soul has dedicated to despair,
And you would consent, virgin of loves,
For me to rest my breast for just a moment!
I am perhaps a madman to love you so,
To wither my life in delirium...
If in dreams of love you never trembled
Dreaming of my love and my martyrdom!
- And I could not, feverish and kneeling,
With a burning and consumed mind,
Tell you of my heart's hopes
And the sweet illusions of my life! (frag)
Despair
Happy is he who in the book of his soul
Has no written pages,
And no bitter, regretful longing,
No cursed tears!
Happy is he who has not even breathed
The tresses of an angel
And has not drunk intoxicating effluvia
From a woman's voice!
And has not felt her fragrant white hand
Lost in his hair,
Nor has slid from delightful dream
Into real nightmares!
Who has never kissed you, flower of loves,
Flower of my heart,
And has not asked for coolness, feverish and insane,
From the night breeze!
Ah! Happy is he who slept in the burning breast
Of the houri of loves,
Who eagerly drank the holy dew
From the perfumed flowers. (...) What remains for me, my God?! For my sighs
Not even the breeze moans,
And within - in the desert of my chest
The heart does not sleep!
Sonnet
Pale, in the dim lamplight,
Reclining on a bed of flowers,
Like the moon on an embalmed night,
She slept amidst clouds of love!
She was the sea maiden! In the cold foam
Rocked by the tide!
She was an angel amidst dawn clouds
Bathing and forgetting herself in dreams!
She was the most beautiful! Her breast heaving...
Dark eyes opening their lids...
Naked forms sliding on the bed...
Do not laugh at me, my beautiful angel!
For you - I watched the nights crying,
For you - in dreams I will die smiling!
Ballad of the Viola
This painful existence
Tires my chest: I know well
That I will die!
Yet from my life
The flower could be nourished
In your love!
From the heart's depths
A sigh escapes! In your breath
I breathe!
But at least gaze into my eyes: I want to see them
To die!
Keep the viola with you
Where your eyes sang for me...
And I sighed!
Only the thought consoles me
That I die as I lived...
I die for you!
If one day your pure soul
Misses me,
My seraphim!
Perhaps notes of tenderness
Inspire the mad love
Of the troubadour!
Remembrance of Death
When the fiber breaks within my chest,
That binds the spirit to living pain,
Do not shed a single tear for me
From a demented eyelid.
And do not pluck in impure matter
The valley flower that sleeps in the wind:
I do not want a note of joy
To be silenced by my sad thoughts.
I leave life as the weariness leaves
The dusty traveler of the desert
- Like the hours of a long nightmare
That fades with the toll of a bell;
Like the exile of my wandering soul,
Where insane fire consumed it.
I only carry one longing - it is for those times
That loving illusion made beautiful.
I only carry one longing - it is for those shadows
That I felt watching over my nights...
Of you, O my mother! Poor, unfortunate one
Who wastes away from my sadness!
From my father... from my only friends,
Few - very few - and who did not mock
When on feverish nights, driven mad,
My pale beliefs doubted.
If a tear floods my eyelids,
A sigh still trembles in my chest,
It is for the maiden I dreamed of... who never
Leaned her beautiful face to my lips!
Only you, O dreamer of youth,
Of the pale poet, gave me flowers...
If I lived, it was for you! And in hope
Of enjoying your love in life.
I will kiss the holy and naked truth,
I will see the friendly dream crystallize...
O my maiden of wandering dreams,
Daughter of heaven, I will love with you!
Rest my solitary bed
In the forest of forgotten men,
In the shade of a cross, and write upon it:
- He was a poet, he dreamed and he loved in life. -
Shadows of the valley, nights of the mountain,
That my soul sang and loved so much,
Protect my abandoned body,
And in the silence, shed a song upon it!
But when the dawn bird preludes
And when at midnight the sky rests,
Groves of the forest, open your branches...
Let the moon weep upon my tomb!
PART II
The second part of A Lira dos Vinte Anos is composed of 14 poems and does not thematically align with the
first and third. It also begins with a preface:
"Be careful, reader, when turning this page!
Here the visionary and Platonic world dissipates. We are entering a new world, a fantastic land, a true island of
Barataria for Don Quixote, where Sancho is king; (...)
Almost after Ariel, we stumble upon Caliban.
The reason is simple. It is because the unity of this book is founded on a binomial. Two souls dwelling in the caves of a
poet's brain, more or less, wrote this book, a true two-faced medal (...) "
The first question that comes to mind is: who are Ariel and Caliban, the figures the poet relies on, indicating
changes? They are characters from Shakespeare's play The Tempest. Ariel represents Balance, Good, Harmony, the
clear and amiable face of beings, while Caliban symbolizes Evil, the dark side of beings, disorder, imbalance.
Having said this, it is clear that Álvares de Azevedo wants to highlight something: Part II contains the ironic poems,
parodies, a supposed "satanism" found only in Noite na Taverna.
A Poet's Corpse!
From so much inspiration and so much life
That inflamed the convulsive nerves
And burned without comfort...
What remains? A faded shadow,
A wretch who agonized without a mother...
A dead poet remains!
To die! It is to slip into the grave,
Illusions cold on the forehead - the heart
Broken!
May no regrets of an impure life
Be carried away, where I gasped with hunger... without a bed!
In darkness and solitude!
You were like the sun; you seemed
To have eternity in the dawn of life
Written on your broad forehead...
But you will not return as you appeared!
Your sun of youth has set
In a cursed darkness!
Your star lied. And from the fate
Of your life, the first page
Was torn in the tomb...
Poor genius of God, not even a shroud!
Neither tomb nor cross! Like the skull
That a wolf devoured!...
My Angel
My angel has the charm, the wonder,
Of the spontaneous song of little birds;
Has breasts so white, so soft
Like the silky fur of ermines.
Sad at night by the window I see her
And I hear her moan from her lips.
The vaporous creature is light
Like the faint smoke of a cigar.
(...)
But fate willed that her chest
Did not beat for me for even a minute,
And that she be frivolous and beautiful
Like the light smoke of a cigar. (frag.)
To a Dying Poet
Poets! Tomorrow, at my corpse,
Cut my most sonorous gut!...
Make a string from it and sing upon it
The loves of a hopeful life!
Sing of that summer that sustained me...
The scent of the corrals, the calf,
The birds sighing in the shade,
And the frogs croaking on the path!
Heart, why do you tremble? If this lyre
Plays out of tune in my weak hands,
Before they take you to the cemetery,
Let the divine soul play the marimba!
I die like the duckling squawking in agony in the hands of the cook...
Like the swan of old... that moaning
Amidst hymns of love was moved.
Heart, why do you tremble? I see death,
There she comes, leprous and toothless...
And should I then sleep with her?
If only she would sleep in disguise!
What ruins! What petrified love!
So antediluvian and gigantic!
Well, imagine what tenderness
That worm exposed to the fresh air will have!
Rather a thousand times than sleep with her.
For that fury's pleasure, eternal love
If there is no old woman's love there too,
Give me the cauldrons of the third hell! (frag.)
It's her! It's her! It's her! It's her!
It's her! It's her! - I murmured, trembling,
And the distant echo murmured - it's her!
I saw her... my aerial and pure fairy -
My laundress at the window!
From these stolen waters where I live
I see her hanging her chintz dresses, her white skirts on the roof;
I see her and sigh, in love!
Tonight I dared to be more audacious
On the tiles that creaked under my steps
To spy on her happy sleep,
To see her more beautiful in Morpheus' arms!
How she slept! What a deep sleep!...
She had the iron for starching in her hand...
How she snored, melodious and pure!...
I almost fainted in the street!
I pushed aside the window, entered fearfully...
Her sleeping breast was palpitating...
I went to kiss her... I stole from her breast
A note that was tucked there...
Oh! Surely... (I thought) it's a sweet page
Where her soul poured out gentle loves;
These are her verses... which tomorrow, certainly
She will send me, full of flowers...
I trembled with fever! Fortunate leaf!
Who would rest with you on this breast!
Like Othello kissing his wife,
I kissed it, trembling with delirium...
It's her! It's her! - I repeated, trembling;
But at that moment an owl hooted...
I ciously opened the secret page...
Oh! My God! It was a laundry list!
But if Werther died for seeing Charlotte
Giving bread with butter to the children
If he found her thus more beautiful, - I adore you more
Dreaming of you washing the little shirts!
It is her! It is her, my love, my soul,
Laura, the Beatrice that heaven reveals...
It is her! It is her! - I murmured, trembling,
And the distant echo sighed - it is her!
Courtship on Horseback
I live in Catumbi. But misfortune
That rules my ill-fated life,
Put my beloved Dulcinea at the end of Catete Street.
I rent (three mil-réis) for an afternoon
A trotting horse (what a nag!)
Just to lift my sighing eyes
To my sweetheart at the window...
My entire salary goes into flowers
And pretty sheets of embroidered paper,
Where I write, trembling, lovingly,
Some pretty verse... but stolen.
I'm dying for the girl, next to her
I don't even dare to sigh from shyness...
If she wanted, I'd end the story
Like every comedy - in marriage...
Yesterday it had rained... What a disaster!
I was trotting in English, burning with passion,
But then a cart
Filled my coarse clothes with mud...
I didn't get discouraged! If Don Quixote
On Rocinante, raising his large sword,
Never turned back from fear, I, more brave,
Even dirty went to see my sweetheart...
But as I passed by the building
Where my beauty lives in the shops,
Seeing me so muddy, she, annoyed,
Hit me on the nose with the window...
The horse, ignorant of love affairs,
Took the slap between its teeth,
Bristles, jumps, and throws me
Legs in the air, onto the pavement...
To the devil with courtship. I brushed
My hat, which had suffered in the dance,
I fled, head down, with my legs running,
And roaring with anger like a goat.
Aggravating circumstance. My English trousers
Tore in the fall, right down the middle,
Blood ran from my nose
As payment for the amorous delusion!...
THIRD PART
Thirty poems make up the third part of the book, which contains a total of 77 poetic compositions. No preface,
no opening indication; but we know that thematically, we will find the same intention as in Part I:
adolescent reveries, unattainable love, metaphorized eroticism, family, themes of death and suffering, the
poet so young... and the same intimacy, the restless and confessional tone:
My Desire
My desire? To be the white glove
That your gentle little hand squeezes;
The camellia that wilts on your breast,
The angel who deserts heaven to see you...
My desire? To be the little shoe
That your dainty foot wears at the ball...
The hope you dream of in the future,
The longing you have here on earth...
My desire? To be the curtain
That does not count the mysteries of your bed;
To be the cross of your black silk necklace
With which you sleep upon your chest.
My desire? To be your mirror
That sees you more beautiful when you unfasten
Your ball clothes of silk and flowers!
And admires your naked charms lovingly!
My desire? To be the sheet of your bed
Of cambric, the pillow
With which you cover your breast, where you rest,
With hair loose, your enchanting face...
My desire? To be the voice of the earth
That hears love from the star of heaven!
To be the lover you dream of, whom you desire
But imagine enchanted dreams of languor!
Sonnet
The fifteen years of a transparent soul
Brown hair, pure face,
Eyes where candor is painted
Of a heart that sleeps, still innocent.
A breast that suddenly trembles
From the dainty white dress,
The lovely hand on the graceful waist,
And a voice that inebriates sweetly.
A smile so angelic! So holy
And in the blue eyes full of life
A languid veil of involuntary tears!
This is the talisman, this is the Armida,
The enchantment of my last charms,
The vision of my distracted soul!
Goodbye, my dreams!
Goodbye, my dreams, I weep and die!
I carry no longing from existence!
And so much life that filled my chest
Died in my sad youth!
Most wretched! I devoted my poor days
To the mad fate of a fruitless love,
And my soul now sleeps in darkness
Like a gaze that death envelops in mourning.
What remains for me, my God? Let die with me
The star of my innocent loves,
Since I carry not even a handful of withered flowers
In my dead chest!
"Rest my solitary bed
In the forest of forgotten men,
In the shade of a cross, and write upon it:
- He was a poet, he dreamed and he loved in life."
("Remembrance of Death")
We can find Álvares de Azevedo's work within the second phase of Romantic poetry in Brazil; therefore, in Ultra-Romanticism, also known as Byronism.
And although the poet died extremely young, at twenty years old, he can be supremely considered the most important writer of his time. All his work was published posthumously (A Lira dos Vinte anos (1853), Noite na Taverna, tales (1855), and Macário, theatre (1855)).
A Lira dos Vinte Anos
A Lira dos Vinte Anos comprises the best of Álvares de Azevedo's production. Structurally, it is divided into three parts; but from a thematic point of view, into only two. Why?
The first and third parts have similar themes: death, family, themes of adolescence, dreams, religiosity, the female form as an obsession; the second part, however, brings the ironic, the "satanic," the woman, even in dreams, approached through the erotic, carnal.
Part I
Composed of 33 poems, it begins with a preface bearing a suggestive epithet from Bocage:
"Singing life, as the swan sings death."
The poet warns us:
"These are the first songs of a poor poet. Forgive them. The first calls of the thrush do not have the sweetness of its love songs.
It is a lyre, but without strings; a spring, but without flowers; a crown of leaves, but without freshness.
Spontaneous songs of the heart, painful vibrations of the internal lyre that stirred a dream, notes that the wind carried away - like these, I bring these harmonies to light.
These are the torn pages of an unread book... (...)"
The first part of the Lyre contains poems whose theme is intimate: pains of the heart, fear of death, the woman who sometimes appears and sometimes hides, family, dreams and fantasy that blend, mainly through metaphorical play in the eroticization of women. In this part, symbols emerge that hint at repressed sexuality.
Observe some texts:
At Sea
It was night - you were sleeping,
In the melodies of dreams,
In the cool breeze;
Rocked in the felucca,
In the cold moonlight,
To the sighs of my heart!
Ah! What a veil of paleness
On your languid face!
How your heaving breasts
Palpitated in your sleep!
How I mused, kissing
Your loose dark hair!
Were you dreaming? - I was not sleeping;
My soul was drinking in
Your pensive soul!
And you trembled, beautiful lover,
At my kisses, like
The leaves of the sensitive plant! (frag.)
When at night in the perfumed bed
You recline your languid forehead in sleep,
In the vapor of illusion, why is your divine eyelid
Dewed with tears of love?
And when I contemplate you asleep
Your hair loose on the soft bed,
Why does a warm sigh resonate
And gently fade in your chest?
Virgin of my love, the stolen kiss
That I place on your sleeping face
Does it not remind your heart of my loves
And the fever of my life's dreams?
Sleep, O angel of love! In your silence
My chest drowns in tenderness
And I feel that the future is not worth a kiss
Nor heaven in your sigh of bliss! (...) (fragment)
The Poet
It was a night - I was sleeping
And in my dreams I relived
The illusions I dreamed!
And at my side I felt...
My God! Why didn't I die?
Why did I wake up in my sleep?
In my bed - asleep
Palpitating and dejected,
The lover of my love!
Her hair perfuming
Running over my face
Like moonlight on a flower!
I felt her fragrant chest
Breathing eagerly;
And on her lips, which I parted,
A languid breath,
A dream of the heart
That died sighing!
It was not a false dream;
My deluded heart
Felt it and did not dream:
And it felt itself lost
In a pain it did not know...
It didn't even kiss her!
(...)
And if I, trembling, madam,
Were to come pale now
To remind you of my dream,
With a pale forehead
And a choked voice
To tell you softly - It is I!
It is I! Who have not forgotten
The night I did not sleep,
That it was not an illusion!
It is I who feel dying
The hope of living...
That I feel it in my heart! - (frag.)
When I speak to you, my chest
Forgets this pain that consumes me:
Perhaps pleasure runs through the soul's fibers:
And I still dare to whisper your name!
What an existence, woman! If you knew
The heartache of your lover,
And the sighs that in the silence of the night,
Gasp in his delirious chest!
And how much he suffers and has suffered, and the fever
That has paled his lips in life,
And his soul tired in convulsive pain
And fell asleep in consumed ashes!
Perhaps you would pity the insane sorrow
That my soul has dedicated to despair,
And you would consent, virgin of loves,
For me to rest my breast for just a moment!
I am perhaps a madman to love you so,
To wither my life in delirium...
If in dreams of love you never trembled
Dreaming of my love and my martyrdom!
- And I could not, feverish and kneeling,
With a burning and consumed mind,
Tell you of my heart's hopes
And the sweet illusions of my life! (frag)
Despair
Happy is he who in the book of his soul
Has no written pages,
And no bitter, regretful longing,
No cursed tears!
Happy is he who has not even breathed
The tresses of an angel
And has not drunk intoxicating effluvia
From a woman's voice!
And has not felt her fragrant white hand
Lost in his hair,
Nor has slid from delightful dream
Into real nightmares!
Who has never kissed you, flower of loves,
Flower of my heart,
And has not asked for coolness, feverish and insane,
From the night breeze!
Ah! Happy is he who slept in the burning breast
Of the houri of loves,
Who eagerly drank the holy dew
From the perfumed flowers. (...) What remains for me, my God?! For my sighs
Not even the breeze moans,
And within - in the desert of my chest
The heart does not sleep!
Sonnet
Pale, in the dim lamplight,
Reclining on a bed of flowers,
Like the moon on an embalmed night,
She slept amidst clouds of love!
She was the sea maiden! In the cold foam
Rocked by the tide!
She was an angel amidst dawn clouds
Bathing and forgetting herself in dreams!
She was the most beautiful! Her breast heaving...
Dark eyes opening their lids...
Naked forms sliding on the bed...
Do not laugh at me, my beautiful angel!
For you - I watched the nights crying,
For you - in dreams I will die smiling!
Ballad of the Viola
This painful existence
Tires my chest: I know well
That I will die!
Yet from my life
The flower could be nourished
In your love!
From the heart's depths
A sigh escapes! In your breath
I breathe!
But at least gaze into my eyes: I want to see them
To die!
Keep the viola with you
Where your eyes sang for me...
And I sighed!
Only the thought consoles me
That I die as I lived...
I die for you!
If one day your pure soul
Misses me,
My seraphim!
Perhaps notes of tenderness
Inspire the mad love
Of the troubadour!
Remembrance of Death
When the fiber breaks within my chest,
That binds the spirit to living pain,
Do not shed a single tear for me
From a demented eyelid.
And do not pluck in impure matter
The valley flower that sleeps in the wind:
I do not want a note of joy
To be silenced by my sad thoughts.
I leave life as the weariness leaves
The dusty traveler of the desert
- Like the hours of a long nightmare
That fades with the toll of a bell;
Like the exile of my wandering soul,
Where insane fire consumed it.
I only carry one longing - it is for those times
That loving illusion made beautiful.
I only carry one longing - it is for those shadows
That I felt watching over my nights...
Of you, O my mother! Poor, unfortunate one
Who wastes away from my sadness!
From my father... from my only friends,
Few - very few - and who did not mock
When on feverish nights, driven mad,
My pale beliefs doubted.
If a tear floods my eyelids,
A sigh still trembles in my chest,
It is for the maiden I dreamed of... who never
Leaned her beautiful face to my lips!
Only you, O dreamer of youth,
Of the pale poet, gave me flowers...
If I lived, it was for you! And in hope
Of enjoying your love in life.
I will kiss the holy and naked truth,
I will see the friendly dream crystallize...
O my maiden of wandering dreams,
Daughter of heaven, I will love with you!
Rest my solitary bed
In the forest of forgotten men,
In the shade of a cross, and write upon it:
- He was a poet, he dreamed and he loved in life. -
Shadows of the valley, nights of the mountain,
That my soul sang and loved so much,
Protect my abandoned body,
And in the silence, shed a song upon it!
But when the dawn bird preludes
And when at midnight the sky rests,
Groves of the forest, open your branches...
Let the moon weep upon my tomb!
PART II
The second part of A Lira dos Vinte Anos is composed of 14 poems and does not thematically align with the
first and third. It also begins with a preface:
"Be careful, reader, when turning this page!
Here the visionary and Platonic world dissipates. We are entering a new world, a fantastic land, a true island of
Barataria for Don Quixote, where Sancho is king; (...)
Almost after Ariel, we stumble upon Caliban.
The reason is simple. It is because the unity of this book is founded on a binomial. Two souls dwelling in the caves of a
poet's brain, more or less, wrote this book, a true two-faced medal (...) "
The first question that comes to mind is: who are Ariel and Caliban, the figures the poet relies on, indicating
changes? They are characters from Shakespeare's play The Tempest. Ariel represents Balance, Good, Harmony, the
clear and amiable face of beings, while Caliban symbolizes Evil, the dark side of beings, disorder, imbalance.
Having said this, it is clear that Álvares de Azevedo wants to highlight something: Part II contains the ironic poems,
parodies, a supposed "satanism" found only in Noite na Taverna.
A Poet's Corpse!
From so much inspiration and so much life
That inflamed the convulsive nerves
And burned without comfort...
What remains? A faded shadow,
A wretch who agonized without a mother...
A dead poet remains!
To die! It is to slip into the grave,
Illusions cold on the forehead - the heart
Broken!
May no regrets of an impure life
Be carried away, where I gasped with hunger... without a bed!
In darkness and solitude!
You were like the sun; you seemed
To have eternity in the dawn of life
Written on your broad forehead...
But you will not return as you appeared!
Your sun of youth has set
In a cursed darkness!
Your star lied. And from the fate
Of your life, the first page
Was torn in the tomb...
Poor genius of God, not even a shroud!
Neither tomb nor cross! Like the skull
That a wolf devoured!...
My Angel
My angel has the charm, the wonder,
Of the spontaneous song of little birds;
Has breasts so white, so soft
Like the silky fur of ermines.
Sad at night by the window I see her
And I hear her moan from her lips.
The vaporous creature is light
Like the faint smoke of a cigar.
(...)
But fate willed that her chest
Did not beat for me for even a minute,
And that she be frivolous and beautiful
Like the light smoke of a cigar. (frag.)
To a Dying Poet
Poets! Tomorrow, at my corpse,
Cut my most sonorous gut!...
Make a string from it and sing upon it
The loves of a hopeful life!
Sing of that summer that sustained me...
The scent of the corrals, the calf,
The birds sighing in the shade,
And the frogs croaking on the path!
Heart, why do you tremble? If this lyre
Plays out of tune in my weak hands,
Before they take you to the cemetery,
Let the divine soul play the marimba!
I die like the duckling squawking in agony in the hands of the cook...
Like the swan of old... that moaning
Amidst hymns of love was moved.
Heart, why do you tremble? I see death,
There she comes, leprous and toothless...
And should I then sleep with her?
If only she would sleep in disguise!
What ruins! What petrified love!
So antediluvian and gigantic!
Well, imagine what tenderness
That worm exposed to the fresh air will have!
Rather a thousand times than sleep with her.
For that fury's pleasure, eternal love
If there is no old woman's love there too,
Give me the cauldrons of the third hell! (frag.)
It's her! It's her! It's her! It's her!
It's her! It's her! - I murmured, trembling,
And the distant echo murmured - it's her!
I saw her... my aerial and pure fairy -
My laundress at the window!
From these stolen waters where I live
I see her hanging her chintz dresses, her white skirts on the roof;
I see her and sigh, in love!
Tonight I dared to be more audacious
On the tiles that creaked under my steps
To spy on her happy sleep,
To see her more beautiful in Morpheus' arms!
How she slept! What a deep sleep!...
She had the iron for starching in her hand...
How she snored, melodious and pure!...
I almost fainted in the street!
I pushed aside the window, entered fearfully...
Her sleeping breast was palpitating...
I went to kiss her... I stole from her breast
A note that was tucked there...
Oh! Surely... (I thought) it's a sweet page
Where her soul poured out gentle loves;
These are her verses... which tomorrow, certainly
She will send me, full of flowers...
I trembled with fever! Fortunate leaf!
Who would rest with you on this breast!
Like Othello kissing his wife,
I kissed it, trembling with delirium...
It's her! It's her! - I repeated, trembling;
But at that moment an owl hooted...
I ciously opened the secret page...
Oh! My God! It was a laundry list!
But if Werther died for seeing Charlotte
Giving bread with butter to the children
If he found her thus more beautiful, - I adore you more
Dreaming of you washing the little shirts!
It is her! It is her, my love, my soul,
Laura, the Beatrice that heaven reveals...
It is her! It is her! - I murmured, trembling,
And the distant echo sighed - it is her!
Courtship on Horseback
I live in Catumbi. But misfortune
That rules my ill-fated life,
Put my beloved Dulcinea at the end of Catete Street.
I rent (three mil-réis) for an afternoon
A trotting horse (what a nag!)
Just to lift my sighing eyes
To my sweetheart at the window...
My entire salary goes into flowers
And pretty sheets of embroidered paper,
Where I write, trembling, lovingly,
Some pretty verse... but stolen.
I'm dying for the girl, next to her
I don't even dare to sigh from shyness...
If she wanted, I'd end the story
Like every comedy - in marriage...
Yesterday it had rained... What a disaster!
I was trotting in English, burning with passion,
But then a cart
Filled my coarse clothes with mud...
I didn't get discouraged! If Don Quixote
On Rocinante, raising his large sword,
Never turned back from fear, I, more brave,
Even dirty went to see my sweetheart...
But as I passed by the building
Where my beauty lives in the shops,
Seeing me so muddy, she, annoyed,
Hit me on the nose with the window...
The horse, ignorant of love affairs,
Took the slap between its teeth,
Bristles, jumps, and throws me
Legs in the air, onto the pavement...
To the devil with courtship. I brushed
My hat, which had suffered in the dance,
I fled, head down, with my legs running,
And roaring with anger like a goat.
Aggravating circumstance. My English trousers
Tore in the fall, right down the middle,
Blood ran from my nose
As payment for the amorous delusion!...
THIRD PART
Thirty poems make up the third part of the book, which contains a total of 77 poetic compositions. No preface,
no opening indication; but we know that thematically, we will find the same intention as in Part I:
adolescent reveries, unattainable love, metaphorized eroticism, family, themes of death and suffering, the
poet so young... and the same intimacy, the restless and confessional tone:
My Desire
My desire? To be the white glove
That your gentle little hand squeezes;
The camellia that wilts on your breast,
The angel who deserts heaven to see you...
My desire? To be the little shoe
That your dainty foot wears at the ball...
The hope you dream of in the future,
The longing you have here on earth...
My desire? To be the curtain
That does not count the mysteries of your bed;
To be the cross of your black silk necklace
With which you sleep upon your chest.
My desire? To be your mirror
That sees you more beautiful when you unfasten
Your ball clothes of silk and flowers!
And admires your naked charms lovingly!
My desire? To be the sheet of your bed
Of cambric, the pillow
With which you cover your breast, where you rest,
With hair loose, your enchanting face...
My desire? To be the voice of the earth
That hears love from the star of heaven!
To be the lover you dream of, whom you desire
But imagine enchanted dreams of languor!
Sonnet
The fifteen years of a transparent soul
Brown hair, pure face,
Eyes where candor is painted
Of a heart that sleeps, still innocent.
A breast that suddenly trembles
From the dainty white dress,
The lovely hand on the graceful waist,
And a voice that inebriates sweetly.
A smile so angelic! So holy
And in the blue eyes full of life
A languid veil of involuntary tears!
This is the talisman, this is the Armida,
The enchantment of my last charms,
The vision of my distracted soul!
Goodbye, my dreams!
Goodbye, my dreams, I weep and die!
I carry no longing from existence!
And so much life that filled my chest
Died in my sad youth!
Most wretched! I devoted my poor days
To the mad fate of a fruitless love,
And my soul now sleeps in darkness
Like a gaze that death envelops in mourning.
What remains for me, my God? Let die with me
The star of my innocent loves,
Since I carry not even a handful of withered flowers
In my dead chest!
