Poesía en Inglés

Francisco Azuela

(Mexico)

Francisco Azuela, was born in León City, Guanajuato, México, in 1948.  He is the grandson of  Mariano Azuela, first novelist of the Mexican Revolution.  He studied at the Universities of Guanajuato, Iberoamericana, UNAM and Panamericana of Mexico City and in the Complutense of Madrid and Laval in Québec.   Mr. Azuela is a member of the General Society of Writers of Mexico, Ordinary Member, and Member of the Panamerican Counsel of CISAC and Member of the International Writers Guild. 
He was a diplomat in the Mexican Embassies in Costa Rica and Honduras (1973-1983) and was decorated with the Order of the Central American Liberator FRANCISCO MORAZAN, rank of Official, by the Honduran Government.  He was a candidate of the Honduran Academy of Language at the International Literary Prize CENVANTES of Spain in 1981.

He has published:

El Maldicionero (Universidad Nacional Autónoma de Honduras, 3ª.ed.,1981)
El Tren de Fuego (Instituto de la Cultura del Estado de Guanajuato, 1993)
La Parole Ardente, edición bilingüe (John Donne & Cie., France, 1993)
Son las Cien de la Tarde (Instituto de la Cultura del Estado de Guanajuato, 1996)
Ángel del Mar de mis Sueños (Centro Cultural Internacional El Cóndor de los Andes-Águila Azteca, A.C., 2000).

The Hands of Che
Symphonic Poem.

For poets Giovana Mulas and Gabriel Impaglione
whith my timeless friendship.
 

Translated by the poet Reynaldo Marcos Padua

From the unpublished book:
Cordillera Real de los Andes

 
First Canto
 
 
Late, I’ ve not arrived, Commander,
to salute your name
 
of great a history in America
where we all fit.
 
I live in the house next door
where your hands lay hidden in Bolivia;
every morning I put mine over
that brick and stone wall
to greet you.
 
In the starry night of October
I see the luminous flight of  a red condor
above the Royal Cordillera of the Andes
beneath the Andean Cross
I can see your hands and death mask
flying over Time.
 
From the Nancahuazu Cannon
your  fighters and commanders accompany you,
those who felt the soil
of the Incahuasi monuntain range,
and drank the forest thickness
from the river of the Yacunday Creek.
 
Those buried in Choreti
behind the brick furnaces,
and those lost in Alto Seco
and in the San Lorenzo River
where Tania still strolls
in solitude.
 
At 13:30 of that a black Sunday
October the 8th of 1967,
Your voice was heard:
“Don’t kill me, I give up, I’m Che,
worthier alive than dead!”
 
 
Second Canto
 
 
They who killed you,
who cut you off  in pieces,
travelers of the darker side of history,
deserve oblivion.
 
They seeded in Valle Grande
and in Quebrada del Yuro
the blood of those who lit our history.

 

Third Canto
 
 
Commander of America
sad wing of the morning winds
the sun cuts across your horizon,
your blood shed was not in vain.
I still think about that formol flask
transcending a full rain of hopes.
 
Here, they made you a heroe,
they made you fatherland
for you planted the way of stars.
You are the motherland,
America the homeland.
 
Thorn ground
of dark creeks and darks paths
where your memories
opened onto life.
 
Commander,
with fraternal embrace
today I also greet you.
You are triumphant,
we all triumphant with you.
Your hands have traveled
To rendevous with the remaining
of your aching body,
mortally wounded
Che Commander,
America’s live monument,
comrade of time and of  the dawn
in which arises your cicatrized soul.

La Paz, Bolivia May 14, 2006
 f_azuela@yaho.com.ar