Álvaro Miranda (Colombia)
Por:
Álvaro Miranda
Traductor:
Nicolás Suescún
HERE IT SEEMED TO THE SUN KING THAT HE SHOULD WIN
ANOTHER BATTLE, THAT OF THE VERB AND ON ACCOUNT OF
THIS HE INSISTED IN REPEATING IN ANOTHER WAY WHAT HE HAD SAID BEFOREHAND
Second version for the beloved Court
What shady places has Spain
that neither halters nor spurs
only rinds hang from you
in the goiters and the crests;
quintals for the buttocks
and teats for the balls.
What rascal made spells,
what in the devil cut the glories out:
that only defeats are left to you from Flanders to Pavia.
Come then my lords
dinner is served:
manatee I give to you for meat
and lordships:
in the name of your mothers
What a drag!
Álvaro Miranda was born in Santa Marta, Colombia, in 1945. His first poetry book Indiada appears in 1971. In 1982, when he received The National Poetry Prize, The University of Antioquia published Los Esceritos de Don Sancho Jimeno. His novel, La risa del cuervo, written in 1993, obtained the first prize in Buenos Aires and was published the next year by The University of Belgrano. Re-written during several years and published again in Bogotá. (Thomas de Quincey publishers, 1992), it is awarded by Colcultura, with the Pedro Gómez Valderrama Award. Simulación de un reino compiles the poetic work of Alvaro Miranda, written between 1965 and 1995, poems that were scattered in newspapers, magazines and collective books. (Tropicomaquia, Indiada, cuatro de Lebrija, Los Escritos de Sancho de Jimeno, and his most recent work, Simulación de un Reino).
