Snow White
Rent from DeepDyve- Snow White
I fit better in the worldif I accept what I had judged impossible:“Not every German knows Mozart.”Of course—it’s not required.But every country has its universal,and that’s all it takes for us to understand each another.I feel at home with the Russiansbecause they can’t see a trace of fog,a trickle of river, a flower in the grasswithout stopping to spew diminutives for interminable minutes.Just like the bandit Riobaldo who knows the whole world—and has Minas Gerais in the palm of his hand.Hyperbole gets me closer to where I want to go.Wasn’t Christ’s “Perverse generation of vipers”an exaggeration, a way to release his rage?The Scribes and Pharisees took him seriously.But all of them? Really?The majority of us smell bad,and we all suffer in fear. The body wants to exist,and sounds distressing alarms.I lean toward anything apocryphal, like someone digging for treasure.Very Christian, the dwarves in the storywhistling while they work.Deep down, we all wantto know biblically,in spite of the footnotesmad to clean things up,and not always helpful. [End Page 59] The true thing is dirty,necessarily dirtyGod’s sweetness is not a nicetyIf I were brave, I’d say the thingsthat make me ashamedand some people would hate me,wounded by embarrassment.Thank God I’m fearful,the instinct for survivalturns my tongue kind.I accept praisefor exhibiting “selective judgment.”When asked, I give a list of good movies.I’m slow to learnthat a straight line is perfectly uncomfortable.I’m curved, mixed, and broken,I’m human. Like a crazy person,I beat my head simply to enjoy the delightof the pain vanishing when I stop. [End Page 60]
Adélia Prado is one of the foremost poets of Brazil, praised both in literary circles and the mainstream media. Veja (Brazil’s Newsweek) praised her as ‘‘a writer of rare brilliance and invincible simplicity.’’ Carlos Drummond de Andrade famously declared: ‘‘Adélia is lyrical, biblical, existential; she makes poetry as naturally as nature makes weather.’’ She has two collections in English: The Alphabet in the Park: Selected Poems of Adélia Prado and Ex-Voto, both translated by Ellen Doré Watson. Prado is the eighth and most recent recipient of the prestigious Lifetime Achievement Award from Canada’s Griffin Trust for Excellence in Poetry.
Ellen Doré Watson is Adélia Prado’s long-time translator. Her own fifth and most recent book is Dogged Hearts. Recipient of an nea translation grant and fellowships to MacDowell and Yaddo, Watson serves as poetry and translation editor of the Massachusetts Review, directs the poetry center at Smith College, and teaches in the Drew University low-residency mfa program in poetry and poetry in translation.
