The Trapeze Artist (Poems)

 The Trapeze Artist

Prologue

The following verses are the result of a long journey of introspection. They represent a lifetime's effort to maintain the balance between expectations, shortcomings, and the constant search for virtue. This anthology is, in essence, my flight log as a trapeze artist on the stage of existence.

Awakening far from home

The Merchant

 

(A tribute to Werner Sauter)

 

Since departing for foreign lands,

armed myself with grit and courage;

with your advice, and with your blessings.

With, the high expectations you held for me.

 

I have returned home,

after a long journey,

to the bookstore,

to the warehouse,

to sell paper and pencil,

as you did, as grandfather did.

 

I have returned home

after arduous training;

I learned to sweep warehouse floors

and deliver goods as a driver.

 

I have returned home

after dusting shelves,

spending hours behind the counter

and walking in the rain,

with the suitcase you gave me.

 

I have returned, after learning how to travel;

to sleep and eat in unfamiliar places.

Sometimes alone, sometimes with strangers,

but always accompanied by the people.

 

I have returned for that lesson I always learned:

To be good, to be honest, to be humble.

To know how to wait.

To be courteous.

To know how to forgive,

and how to ask for forgiveness.

 

You taught me discipline and order,

To be brave, to master my temperament,

To exercise and eat well.

Music, geography, history, and languages.

 

And in the evenings,

exhausted from a full day's work,

learned to add and subtract.

And studied the letters of your calligraphy.

To collect stamps,

to study maps,

and to play with compasses to mark the North.

 

You were the hero.

After long journeys on horseback,

under downpours and through mud,

you brought home a bit of silver

to sustain the household.

And never complained!

 

And how could I not be so proud of you,

when the spirit of others has worn thin.

You never stopped loving the forest,

the homeland,

the sea.

A selfless son, a faithful brother, a family man. 

My homeland

I am going to tell you a story

—Grandpa, why do you have this gold coin of Rubén Darío? 
—Paco, I bought it from a lady who fled Nicaragua.
I told her it was in good hands,
because I was Aquileo’s great-grandson.

Darío and Aquileo were good friends.
How much I appreciate his words
that are on a plaque in Morazán Park!

Who knows what they used to talk about?

-Paco, I had Nicaraguan friends,
when they came here to study
and I was in love with one of them.
María, she was very beautiful,
and I could not win her heart.

—Grandpa, they say that Aquileo
took advantage.
He mocked the peasant
in the Concherías that he wrote.

—One would have to ask Mr. Rubén Darío;
or Magón, rival and cousin, through Zeledón;
and the Congress of that time,
which granted him the Benemeritazgo.
And those who have received the award:
The Aquileo J. Echeverría Prize.

Tell those cynics to study,
and to read his work well:
And to ask his son-in-law, Rosabal Cordero,
"Calandraca," as Chalo, with affection, used to call him.

 How dare those foolish ideologues,
judge the National Poet.
How do they think they know what he felt!
If he were alive to defend himself,
he would have given them a tremendous intellectual beating.

And they do not learn from history,
Socrates put on trial
by a handful of jealous men.
Aquileo, you are already in Parnassus,
and now it is my turn to take up the fight.

-Paco, in life there are people
from whom one must keep their distance.
Envious and selfish, at times;
intellectuals who think differently.

But come here and tell me, Paco,
why are you growing so much?
Sit here and listen to me:
For I am going to tell you a story! 

Clinging to a set of ideas

Two Rivers and a Dead Estuary

(Dos ríos y un estero muerto)

 

This is the story of two rivers:

Lagarto and Malanoche.

Both flow into Sámara Beach,

each with its estuary and mangroves:

today, one is alive; the other, dead.

 
Forty years ago, two Germans bought

farms upriver, in the hills of Nicoya—

lands already eroded by overgrazing,

already scorched by constant fires.

 
One was an environmentalist;

the other, a financier.

 
By chance, in the Lagarto basin,

"Don Sauter" respected the twenty yards of the creeks:

he planted eleven thousand pochotes and native species,

leaving the rest of the pastures to grow wild

so the forest could rise again.

 
The Malanoche basin suffered the misfortune

that Mr. Rakel only cared for profit:

when he ordered the forest by the creeks to be cleared,

the workers refused—it defied law and custom;

to which he replied: "We shall plant teak,

and trees are trees."

 
It was not so! As the teaks grew,

in a monoculture,

they laid down a golden silk tablecloth—

leaves so large and dense

that nothing grows on the ground beneath.

 
Teak is exotic;

brought from Thailand and those far-off lands,

it thrives on flat, alluvial plains.

Every year, the coastal rainstorms

hurled merciless darts of water at the earth;

each drop pierced the soil,

and with no roots or brush to hold it,

it turned into a torrent of mud.

 
Down in the Malanoche estuary,

I began to notice strange stones in the sand—

they weren't shells or dead corals:

they had to be coming from the hills!

 
God knows how much I wanted

to mitigate this catastrophe:

there lay the estuary lagoon,

bordered by giant mangroves;

and beneath it, the Great Aquifer of Samara.

 
A sanctuary for fish to spawn,

for fry to grow, healthy and strong,

bravely launching themselves into the sea,

only to return later and repeat the cycle.

 
We brought volunteers from abroad,

we spoke with the community;

there were even death threats

if the water intakes were touched.

 
Year after year, more stones on the beach

and more mud in the bay.

The corals gave up.

With currents and surges, the furious sea

spat everything back out.

 
Near the Malanoche estuary, the beach changed:

pebbles upon pebbles;

the lagoon filled with sand and dried up,

and the river broke through to reach the sea.


 
—And what happened to the other estuary, the Lagarto?

 
Upriver, in that basin, today there is only forest;

of trees and endemic plants.

The soil is now black with humus, two spans deep.

The troops of howling monkeys from other farms

moved to this refuge,

and there is an entire ecosystem that protects us.

Afterglow and twilight

You (English Translation)

You,

my loved ones, have played a trick on me,

you managed to penetrate

my most perfect fortifications

devised with all the cunning of the years

and proof against cannons.

 

You,

took me by surprise,

tore down wide walls of limestone

with reinforcements of rusted wrought iron

with sharp bevels painted black

that no one dares to approach.

 

You,

I do not know if you used dynamite

or if you enchanted the guards

with the songs of tropical birds;

I only know that you entered and,

I could not stop you.

 

You,

brought me sweet, seductive tales

overflowing with feelings

and I,

mute, could not hold back my tears

filled with so many emotions.

 

I receive,

with immense joy,

such a display of affection;

defeated in my longing for non-existence,

clinging to my prayers, already smoky from so many candles,

already dizzy from so much incense.

 

God, I ask you,

give me the strength I require

to carry out the daily task

and not be a burden to anyone;

and when You so desire

take me, please, to a place where I shall suffer no more.

Final words

The Trapeze Artist

I have always been fascinated by balance,

moderation, respect, and poise.

As a child, my environment was full of rules,

and I soon realized that

my grandmothers and my parents

expected much from me.

 

I tried pushing some boundaries,

without success,

besides, there were uncles, aunts, and great-aunts

who were judges and guardians,

filling my head

with so many stories of relatives

who—God forbid!—transgressed that balance:

alcohol, drugs, gambling, and other vices.

 

Prudence in spending,

avoiding lust at all costs,

effort in my studies,

learning to forgive,

and, above all,

humility and honesty.

 

They instilled in me the love for others;

not to hurt, not to bully.

Yet, amidst so many ups and downs,

there were times when,

among friends, colleagues, and loved ones,

something I said, something I did,

and oh, how it mortifies me:

to be guilty of having caused suffering,

of having caused offense.

 

Seeing tears and sadness,

feeling let down, disappointed, defamed.

That others have done similar things to me

is neither an excuse nor a comfort:

there are wounds that, as much as I have wanted to cover them,

the scars remain,

like brands on cattle.

 

Checks and balances,

and conscience as a rudder;

striving to be a person of integrity,

to be kind and to be polite.

But not to forget oneself so much,

learning to love oneself, even when it wasn't allowed,

for our grandparents had already suffered so much

and only the virtue of work was valued.

 

A whole life spent being a trapeze artist:

good and evil,

greed and charity,

false pride and the gift of people,

temptations and character,

empathy and jealousy.

 

If I had known the Stoics

and something of resilience,

I know that this life of mine would have been different,

I would have remained silent to avoid offending,

and I would be much stronger to forgive.