Pedro Arturo Estrada (Colombia)

Por: Pedro Arturo Estrada
Traductor: Nicolás Suescún

Poetry is Called

Homage to Aldo Pellegrini

Poetry is called all that closes the door to imbeciles, yes.
All that opens, instead,
the vision and the secret of the world to the innocent,
to those that bet on nothing,
those that don't hoard, don't live meekly, don't lurk,
don't make plans and, however, are always on the verge of finding,
as if by chance, even love, death, life itself.

Poetry is all that pulls our feet
towards the impossible. That reveals the other side of things
that sings at the end of the disaster for no reason at all.
That shoves you harshly out of our being
or silently invades "a strange tide"
your innards, till it drowns your eyes.

Poetry is called all that suddenly explodes in the word
without warning or logic. All that cannot properly
be explained to the clever ones, those who are always right.

Poetry is all that comes back after exile,
defeat, fears. The light that returns to the closed rooms
of old memories; the ancient, recovered simplicity of the days.
The wind that reawakens a flame in the night. All that survives us,
that always remains with us after the wound, the deepest loss,
like a last, quiet, -occult strength. The act of touching the loved being begins
in the beats of a single cell and growing
it expands until the absolute evidence.

The eyes see in the target of desire
the entrance to the kingdom of the death.
Courage has recovered territory. Everything happens.

Lovers learn to die together.

Pedro Arturo Estrada was born in Girardota, Antioquia, Colombia, in 1956. Poet, narrator and essayist, he has been literary workshopist and member of the workteam of the House of Poetry Porfirio Barba Jacob in Medellín. His texts have been included in different anthologies, magazines and newspapers of Colombia and abroad. He was awarded the poetry prize Ciro Mendía in 2004. Co-founder of the magazine Fuegos. He has published the books: Poemas en blanco y negro, 1994; Fatum, 2000; and Oscura Edad y otros poemas, 2005.