Tres poemas de Of Death. Minimal Odes de Hilda Hilst

Tres poemas de Of Death. Minimal Odes

por Hilda Hilst

August, 2019

Nota del editor:

Of Death. Minimal Odes, un poemario de la poeta brasileña Hilda Hilst, traducido al inglés por Laura Cesarco Eglin, fue otorgado uno de los Best Translated Book Awards de 2019. El jurado del premio comentó sobre el libro:

The first collection of Hilda Hilst’s poetry to be appear in English, Of Death. Minimal Odes is masterfully translated by Laura Cesarco Eglin. Hilda Hilst’s odes are searing, tender blasphemies. One is drawn to Of Death in the way we’re drawn to things that might be dangerous. These are poems that lure readers well beyond their best interests, regardless of whatever scars might be sustained. In language that is twisted, animalistic, yet at times plain, Eglin reveals another layer in the work of this Brazilian great.

Estamos orgullosos de incluir una selección de poemas de Of Death. Minimal Odes en Latin American Literature Today. Lea los textos originales en portugués más abajo, y haga clic aquí para leer las traducciones al inglés.

Os cascos enfaixados
Para que eu não ouça
Teu duro trote.
É assim, cavalinha,
Que me virás buscar?
Ou porque te pensei
Severa e silenciosa
Virás criança
Num estilhaço de louças?
Amante
Porque te desprezei?
Ou com ares de rei
Porque te fiz rainha?

Como se tu coubesses
Na crista
No topo
No anverso do osso

Tento prender teu corpo
Tua montanha, teu reverso.

Como se a boca buscasse
Seus avessos
Assim te busco
Torsão de todas as funduras.

Persecutória te sigo
Amarras, músculo.
E sempre te assemelhas
A tudo que desliza, tempo,
Correnteza.

Na minha boca. Nos ocos.
No chanfrado nariz.
Rio abaixo deslizas, limo
Toco, em direção a mim.

XVI

Cavalo, búfalo, cavalinha
Te amo, amiga, morte minha,
Se te aproximas, salto
Como quem quer e não quer
Ver a colina, o prado, o outeiro
Do outro lado, como quem quer
E não ousa
Tocar teu pêlo, o ouro

O coruscante vermelho do teu couro
Como quem não quer.

Hilda Hilst

The Brazilian poet, playwright, fiction writer, and essayist, Hilda Hilst was born in 1930 and died in 2004. She is the author of forty books. Literary critics consider her to be one of the most important and controversial twentieth-century writers in the Portuguese language. She has been awarded many literary prizes. She graduated from USP (University of São Paulo) with a degree in Law. In her thirties, Hilst decided to leave the city of São Paulo in order to keep away from social life and concentrate on literature. She went to Campinas and lived in her house Casa do Sol until her death. Because of her strong personality, beauty, intelligence, and her eccentricities, and because Hilst consistently questioned and went against norms and traditions, the myth surrounding Hilst’s image has often overshadowed the importance of her work and the critical analysis of her oeuvre. With the republication of her work by Editora Globo, organized by Alcir Pécora in the early 2000s, Hilst’s work has started gaining more readers in Brazil. She was the author honored in the sixteenth FLIP (Festa Literária Internacional de Paraty) in 2018.

Laura Cesarco Eglin

Laura Cesarco Eglin is a poet and translator from Uruguay. Cesarco Eglin translates from the Spanish, Portuguese, Portuñol, and Galician. She is the translator of Sardine by Miriam Reyes (UDP, 2026). Her translation claus and the scorpion by Galician author Lara Dopazo Ruibal (co•im•press) was longlisted for both the 2023 PEN Award for Poetry in Translation and the 2023 National Translation Award in Poetry. Cesarco Eglin is also the translator of Of Death. Minimal Odes by Brazilian author Hilda Hilst (co•im•press), winner of the 2019 Best Translated Book Award in Poetry. She co-translated from the Portuñol Fabián Severo’s Night in the North (Eulalia Books). She is also the translator of The Mistaken Place of Things by Gabriela Aguirre (Eulalia Books, 2024). Cesarco Eglin is the author of three collections of poetry and five chapbooks, including Break a Part (Finishing Line Press, 2026). Cesarco Eglin is the co-founding editor and publisher of Veliz Books.

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