6.10: Cómo leer la poesía

(Translated from Spanish)

Why express oneself through poetry? 

Poetry is a genre that can respond to any human circumstance to express how we feel or experience the world. By communicating through poetry, the poet engages with a long tradition, with both formal and informal patterns and practices. There are three broad categories of poetry: dramatic (plays in verse), epic (narrative, often with heroic themes), and lyric (more subjective, contemplative—this style is what usually comes to mind when one thinks of poetry). Some poets seek the challenge of writing within certain inherited forms, such as the sonnet, the epigram, the elegy, or an ode. Others employ poetic devices within free verse. Poetic expression has its roots in orality and maintains these ties through time through the ballads and romances of the Middle Ages; the gaucho payadas of the 19th and 20th centuries in the Southern Cone; improvised and sung poetry throughout the centuries; and the more recent spoken word poetry or rap. In poetry there is generally more emphasis on connotation, or the figurative implications of words, the meaning beyond the literal or explicit sense. 

The examples of poetry included in this text come from a variety of countries and historical periods and exemplify distinct forms and themes. Some deal explicitly with health, while others show the range of experiences that can be addressed through poetry. In the field of medicine, poetry sometimes appears as an activity or therapy that “can enhance resilience and reduce anxiety in people with cancer,” [1] a way of negotiating one’s place and purpose in society, or an activity of self-representation and creativity that can contribute to “grassroots expressions of public health.” [2] It can even be useful for those working in the medical field itself to express the successes and difficulties of working with the boundaries between illness and health, as illustrated by the poems and essays of Rafael Campo, a Cuban-American poet and physician. [3] 

Examples of poetic expression appear in almost every section of this book; Chapter 5, “Body, Gender, and Sexuality,” in particular, allows us to explore poetic expressions in depth. You may refer to the ideas and terms explained here as you explore how poetry expresses a multitude of human situations and feelings. 

Basic terms for talking about poetry 

• Poetry is a cultural form; a poem is a poetic text. The word is masculine, despite ending in “a”, thanks to its Greek origin. 

• The poet and the poetess are the terms used to refer to the person who writes the poem. They can also refer to the poetic voice. 

• The poetic speaker (poetic I, lyric speaker, poetic voice, poet): These words are used to refer to the “person” who speaks within the poem; he or she has a role parallel to the narrator in fiction. 

• To talk about the content of the poem, terms such as theme , message , story , and ideas can be used. 

Poetry is evocative: it communicates through connotation

Language can be denotative or connotative . Denotative language refers objectively to something; for example, a star is literally a celestial body. Connotative language carries, in addition to its literal meaning, another expressive sense; the connotations of "star" include someone who excels in their field or destiny. The resources mentioned here infuse language with connotations and can communicate directly to the emotions of readers and listeners. They communicate an effect or idea more intensely, often by drawing a comparison between the poem's new idea and an experience the readers have shared. 

An image is something perceived through one of the five senses—sight, hearing, taste, touch, or smell. It is also the representation in words or in the mind of a sensation. Images lend sensuality to a text. The more detailed and precise the description of an image, the more sensuality it adds to the text. Sometimes its literary value lies in the sensuality itself and the pleasure it evokes. 

Figurative language: analogy, tropes, and other figures 

• Analogy refers to the similarity between different things. Poetry uses various forms of analogy, including metaphor, simile, symbol, archetype, synecdoche, and metonymy. These uses of language are also called figurative language , language whose meaning differs from the literal meaning. 

• Perhaps the most central trope in poetry is the metaphor. Images often carry a metaphorical meaning . With a metaphor, the poet unites two objects and suggests a new relationship between them through a perceived resemblance. In José Martí's "Verse V" (below), the poet employs a metaphor when he refers to his verse as "a mountain of foam," attributing to it the qualities of lightness, abundance, and transience. 

• A simile also makes a comparison, but unlike a metaphor, the comparison is made explicit with the word "like" or "as." Martí also uses a simile in "Verse V" when he says, "My verse is like a dagger." 

• A symbol compares two elements, often based on an image, but it does so with reference to the cultural world in which the poet lives. The symbol generally has a "universal" meaning, that is, a widely recognized meaning. In dominant European and American cultures, for example, the rose has come to be understood as a symbol of beauty and the color white as a symbol of purity. 

• An archetype is a fundamental model, a paradigm of a concept: the hero, the orphan, the widow, the fairy godmother, the witch, God, Heaven, Hell. It is a concept that we may carry in our subconscious and that affects how we understand the world and how we react to cultural texts. 

• Synecdoche also involves a culturally determined comparison, in which a part or example represents the whole object or group. In the expression "daily bread," bread—a staple food—represents everything necessary for life. When it is said that "Spain won the match," the name of the nation—Spain—represents a sports team made up of Spanish players . 

• In metonymy, which is also culturally determined, there is a close association between the object or concept being named and the idea, person, or process to which it refers. In the expression "the sword and the pen," for example, it refers to a person's capacity to perform military duties (the sword) and intellectual activities (the pen). In the following sentence, the word "crown" is a metonym referring to the power to govern: "The marriage of Isabella and Ferdinand united the crowns of Castile and Aragon." 

Other transformations and turns of language 

There are other poetic resources that give language an additional or different meaning than the literal one. 

• The apostrophe represents a “ turn ” in language, as it marks a moment when the poetic voice addresses a person, animal, idea, or object directly, whether inside or outside the poem. The poetic voice shifts from speaking in the third person to using the second person—you. The poetic voice can use the apostrophe to intensify the expression of emotions, to address an absent being intimately, or to create personification. Several poems in this collection feature a continuous apostrophe—the entire poem is addressed to a “you”—such as the poems by César Vallejo and Rosario Castellanos in Part II (chapter 5). In others, the apostrophe interrupts and expresses a change in the poetic voice's attitude, as in “The Grandfather” by Nicolás Guillén (chapter 5). Here the poet begins by speaking of a woman in the third person, “This angelic woman with northern eyes,” but in the first tercet he addresses her directly, “Ah, my lady!” 

• In antithesis, two elements or ideas are contrasted—such as cold and heat or honesty and corruption. The expressive force of antithesis is greater if it is presented with parallel syntax, as in Enrique Lihn's poem (Part II (Chapter 3) “There are only two countries”: “There are only two countries: the country of the healthy and the country of the sick”) and in “To Julia de Burgos,” where the poet says: “You are a cold doll of social lies, / and I, a virile flash of human truth”; the parallelism is seen in the structure of adjective (cold/virile) + noun (doll / flash) + of + quality to be contrasted (social lie / human truth). 

• Hyperbole is exaggeration, as in saying, "I almost died of fright." 

• In irony, the poet seeks to communicate something different from what is literally said, sometimes even its opposite, as if exclaiming after a car accident, "How fabulously lucky I am!" Irony requires a relationship of mutual understanding between the speaker and the listener; otherwise, the meaning fails. 

• In a paradox, the two parts of an opposition or antithesis are united in a seemingly impossible way, yet they communicate a complex conceptual truth. Saint Teresa of Ávila conveys the impossibility of describing mystical experience through paradox: “I live without living in myself / and such a high life I await / that I die because I do not die.” 

• In personification, the speaker attributes human qualities to an animal or inanimate object. In “Sonnet XXIII”, Garcilaso personifies spring with the adjective “joyful” and time with the adjective “angry” (arrogant).

Poetry is music: it organizes sound 

• Rhyme is the matching of sounds at the end of lines of verse or, with internal rhyme , within a line. Rhyme lends musicality to a poem. It can link two or more words to enrich meaning. It can help a spoken poet remember and create verses spontaneously. It can also draw attention to the poet's wit. 

• Consonant rhyme is a rhyme that includes both vowels and consonants. 

• Assonant rhyme includes only the vowels. 

• A blank verse does not rhyme with others. 

Versification 

• A verse is a single line of poetry. It does not have the same meaning as the word "verse" in English. 

• An acute verse has the accent on the last syllable: “I live without living in myself ” (Saint Teresa of Jesus). 

• A plain verse has the accent on the penultimate syllable. “And such a high life is but ” (“I live without living in myself” by Saint Teresa of Jesus). 

• A proparoxytone verse has the accent on the antepenultimate syllable. “And your slender and agile shadow / fine and languid ” (“Nocturne III by José Asunción Silva, Part II, Chapter 5). 

• Meter is the measure or length of a verse. A verse of minor art has fewer than 9 syllables. A verse of major art has 9 or more syllables. 

• A caesura is a pause in the voice within a line of verse. A hemistich is half a line of verse divided in two by a caesura. A synalepha is the merging of the last vowel of one word with the first vowel of the next. Enjambment is the way in which the voice continues without pause from one line of verse to the next because the syntax links the meaning of the words. 

The “Verse V” of Versos sencillos by the poet José Martí is a quatrain, a stanza of four verses. 

Each verse has eight syllables: 

	1	2	3	4	5	6	7	8	Rhyme
	Yo	soy	un	hom	bre	sin	ce	ro	A
	de	don	de	cre	ce	la	pal	ma.	B
	Y_an	tes	de	mo	rir	me	quie	ro	A
	E	char	los	ver	sos	del	al	ma.	B

The quatrain has an ABAB consonant rhyme:

• ero
• alma
• ero
• alma

How to count syllables:

• If there is a consonant between two vowels, the consonant goes with the second vowel: cre / ce, mo / rir. 

• They cannot be separated: p, b, f, c, g plus l or r: a/pro/piar, a/flo/jar. 

• They also cannot be separated: t, d plus r: cua/tro, cua/dro, pie/dra. 

• In other cases of 2 consonants, the two are divided: ár/bol, es/pan/to, car/ne. 

• When three or more consonants appear between two vowels, the last two form a group: in/fla/mar, con/tra/er, em/ple/a/dos. But if the first consonants are ns, they stay together: cons/tar, ins/tau/rar. 

• The contact between two low vowels (a, e, o) requires 2 distinct syllables: a/é/re/o, pe/le/ar, le/a. 

• If a low vowel and a high vowel (i, u) form a diphthong, it constitutes one syllable: ai/re, a/sia, bue/no. 

• A triphthong forms a separate syllable: a/so/ciáis, buey. 

• A high accented vowel + a low unaccented vowel = two distinct syllables: ha/bí/a, pa/ís. 

The stanzas 

• A stanza is a group of several lines of verse. A poem may have stanzas with a structure defined by the number of lines, their length (meter), and their rhyme scheme. Others have flexible stanzas or no stanzas at all. 

• A quatrain is a stanza of four verses. 

• Un romance es un poema de avess octosílabos con rima asonante de los aves pares. 

• A sonnet is a poem of fourteen lines. The lines are generally hendecasyllabic (11 syllables) or alexandrine (14 syllables) with consonant rhyme. The rhyme scheme varies, but it typically groups the lines into two quatrains and two tercets. Examples include ABAB CDCD EFE FEF and ABBA CDDC EFG EFG. 

• Free verse is poetry that does not have a clear rhyme or meter pattern. 

Figures that contribute to the musicality of poetry 

• Alliteration is the repetition of consonant sounds to create an auditory effect. In “Cuerpo de mujer” (chapter 5), Blas de Otero uses alliteration with the letter “t” in the first tercet of the sonnet:

Cuerpo de la mujer, fuente de llanto
donde, después de tanta luz, de tanto
tacto sutil, de Tántalo es la pena.

In English: "Woman's body, source of tears 

where , after so much light, so much 

subtle touch , the pain of Tantalus is found."

Alliteration can contribute to the meaning and effect of a poem in many different ways. In this case, the alliteration seems to connect the meanings of the words *tanta/tanto*, *tacto*, and *Tantalus*. Tantalus is the name of a son of the god Zeus who suffered the punishment of eternal thirst and hunger: although he had to stand by a lake and was very close to the fruit of a tree, whenever he tried to drink the water or pick the fruit, they moved away from him. The alliteration in Otero's verses connects Tantalus's punishment with touch—the inability to touch the woman—and with the word *tanta/tanto*, which indicates abundance: with such abundance, the poet cannot touch the woman's body.

• Anaphora also involves repetition, but of one or more words at the beginning of a phrase, verse, or clause. The repetition of the words “en tanto” in Garcilaso de la Vega’s “Sonnet XXIII” (chapter 4) is an example of anaphora: the two instances of the expression occur at the beginning of two adjacent clauses. The effects of anaphora are diverse: it can add emphasis, draw attention, create acceleration or deceleration, soothe, or intensify emotion. It is a common figure of speech in political rhetoric. Consider, for example, Martin Luther King Jr.’s “I Have a Dream” speech. What effect does it have on Garcilaso’s sonnet? 

• Hyperbaton changes the usual word order. Hyperbaton is often used to give the poet flexibility to place emphasis where they wish in a verse and to aid with rhyme, by placing a certain word at the end of the line even if it means inverting the word order. The exaggerated use of hyperbaton in the Spanish Baroque period—in the 17th century—was also related to the desire to showcase the poet's wit. The first two lines of Garcilaso's "Sonnet XXIII," in which the poet admires his beloved, are: 

En tanto que de rosa y azucena
se muestra la color en vuestro gesto
y que vuestro mirar ardiente, honesto
Enciende al corazón y lo refrena…^[4]

In English: "While the color of rose and lily

is shown in your gesture 
and your ardent, honest gaze 
ignites the heart and restrains it…"

The conventional word order would be, “En tanto que la color de rosa y azucena se muestra en vuestro gesto …” Hyperbaton allows Garcilaso to arrange two hendecasyllabic verses and create a consonant rhyme between“azucena (lily)” and “refrena (restrain),” and “gesto (gesture)” and “honesto (honest)”. It allows the emphasis at the end to fall on “refrenar" that is, halting the man’s advances toward the woman. It also allows the words “gesto” and “honesto” to be associated through the rhyme and their placement at the end of verses 2 and 3, thus linking honesty with the lady’s face.

The application of poetic concepts 

José Martí (1853-1895)

José Julián Martí Pérez (1853-1895) is a national hero in Cuba, renowned for his poetry, essays, journalism, and political activism. He was imprisoned at the age of 16 on charges of treason by the Spanish government. He served two years of his sentence and was exiled to Spain at the age of 18. With an anti-imperialist ideology, he fought for Cuban independence throughout his life but never actually returned to live there. Instead, he traveled and lived in Mexico, Guatemala, Venezuela, and the United States. According to Eugenio de Florit, he wrote the poetry collection Versos sencillos (Simple Verses) at the foot of the Catskill Mountains in New York, seeking simplicity through formal elegance at the beginning of the literary movement known as Spanish American Modernism. [5] Martí returned to his country and died at the Battle of Dos Ríos about four years after the publication of this book.

de José Martí

Si ves un monte de espumas,
Es mi verso lo que ves:
Mi verso es un monte, y es
Un abanico de plumas.

Mi verso es como un puñal
Que por el puño echa flor:
Mi verso es un surtidor
Que da agua de coral.

Mi verso es de un verde claro
Y de un carmín encendido:
Mi verso es un ciervo herido
Que busca en el monte amparo.

Mi verso al valiente agrada:
Mi verso, breve y sincero,
Es del vigor del acero
Con que se funde la espada.

Versos sencillos (1891)

If you see a mountain of foam, 
it is my verse you see: 
My verse is a mountain, and it is 
a fan of feathers. 

My verse is like a dagger 
That blossoms from its hilt: 
My verse is a fountain 
That gives forth coral water. 

My verse is light green 
and bright crimson: 
My verse is a wounded deer 
that seeks refuge in the mountains. 

My verse pleases the brave: 
My verse, brief and sincere, 
Is of the vigor of the steel 
With which the sword is forged. 

Simple Verses (1891) 

How to read the poem: 

1. Begin by reading the entire poem to grasp its overall meaning. Don't forget the importance of the title: Simple Verses . 

2. Look up the words you don't know. 

3. Who is the poetic speaker? Where are they? What do we learn about them in the poem? (Note: if the speaker is going to state that they are a woman or a man, there must be indications of gender in the text.) The poetic voice may be almost entirely absent from the poem; what does this distance imply? In “V” we learn that the speaker is a poet (“my verse”) and we learn a great deal about their philosophy of poetry, what they want to do with their verse. 

4. What is the tone of the poem? What are the central themes? Here, the theme is poetry, its role in life. The tone is strong and confident: the speaker makes a series of assertions about the nature of their poetry. 

5. What are some of the poetic devices used? It helps to make a list of some of these based on the terms already presented. Other devices the author uses are: parallelism; oppositions; repetitions of sounds, words, ideas, and images; symbols (and we learn what they represent according to the context within the poem and the cultural context); and similar and contrasting words. Each stanza begins with “my verse is” (anaphoric repetition); the repetition draws attention to his multiple attempts to define his poetry. In “V,” there are a series of comparisons, and therefore, it seems that his poetry is many things or fulfills many roles at once. Many of these comparisons are metaphors (“my verse is…”) and relate his verse to a mountain and a fan of feathers in the first stanza. 

6. What do these images have in common? Their placement in the poem suggests a relationship between them (a certain parallelism). Are they similar or different? There is a shift in the series of metaphors, however, in the second stanza, which becomes apparent when one begins to connect one metaphor to another: “My verse is like a dagger.” Now we see a simile; perhaps the shift indicates a different relationship between the elements in this instance. Is there anything different about this comparison? 

7. What is the rhythm, rhyme, and versification like here? What does it have to do with the poem's meaning? Here, the poem deals with poetry itself, and when the speaker describes what their poetry is, they support this within the poem. It's simple, with a strong consonant rhyme scheme (abba) that lends a certain unity to each stanza and a strong, song-like rhythm. That's why it's easy to remember. The rhyme also creates an association between terms: foams/feathers, you see/are (linked by both meaning and sound). Supported by the relatively simple language, the regular rhyme makes the poem seem more straightforward. 

8. What is the poem's trajectory? Are there different parts, changes, pauses, or other units within the poem itself? What is the relationship between the poem and the book in which it appears? (Is it part of a series?) What is the relationship between the poem and what we know about the author? What is its relationship to the historical moment and literary tradition? 

9. Does seeking more information about the cultural and historical context in which this poem was produced change how we understand it?

Créditos

• José Martí © Martin Abegglen is licensed under a CC BY-SA (Atribución CompartirIgual) license

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1. Mi traducción, Tegner, et al. Journal of Poetry Therapy 22:3; 121-131. ↵
2. Crawford, et. al. 129 Crawford, Paul, Brian Brown, Carly Baker, Victoria Tischler, Brian Abrams. Health Humanities. Palgrave MacMillan, 2015. ↵
3. In his book The Healing Art , Campo distinguishes between the activity of remedying ( mend ) versus curing or healing in his own practice and in the poems of others.  ↵
4. While rose and lily color your face, and your ardent and honest gaze ignite the heart and restrain it... ↵
5. de Florit, Eugenio. “Los versos de Martí.” En José Martí, Versos, editado por de Florit. Las Américas Publishing Co., 1962: 7-63. ↵