Mário de Andrade trans. Baz Martin Gibbons
Summer 2024 | Poetry
Four Poems
I.
My heart smacks.
That unexpected commonplace: Love.
On the fast tram track...
From Sant’Ana to the city.
From the Earth to the Moon
Jules Verne
Did I cross a comet’s core?
I can feel myself draped in strange lights
And the dazzling disquiet of happiness.
Those cloudless morning eyes...
My heart smacks.
In the meantime the day intensifies.
I went looking for my uniform.
It rained.
Surprise visit.
Talking aesthetics.
Confidential car.
Cariocas lost the match.
Jeez paulistas!2
But those cloudless morning eyes...
My refrain!
I think of her only to think of myself.
I love all the loves of S. Paulo... of Brazil.
I am a hundred mouthed Celebrity
kissing all the women of the world!
Today it’s Suburra3 in my shuddering arms of love!
Madness, calm thyself.
...Days and days of military drills...
Grim predictions...
Future revolutions...
The perspective of a brownish, khaki-
uniformed-ish slave…
My heart smacks.
Love!...
II.
TYPEWRITER.
Q W E R T Y, Remington.
For all the people’s letters.
Mechanical echo
Of feelings typed rapidly.
Hurry, hurry, hurry.
One time they nicked my bro`s typewriter.
That goes into my poetry too
Because he didn't have the cash to buy another.
Machinal equality,
Love hate sadness…
And ironic smiles
For all the people’s letters…
Ne’er-do-wells and Presidents of the Republic
Write with the same letters…
Equality.
Liberty.
Fraternité, point.
Unification of all hands…
All loves
Start with LL's that look alike…
The husband cheating on his wife,
The wife cheating on her husband,
The lovers the children the sweethearts...
“My condolences.”
Tough times.
Dear friend... (And the 50 quid.)
I’ve included it
Thanks.”
And a handwritten signature.
A trick... Waste!
It’s in the letter E.
A lack of astonishment
For souls that suppose facing life!
All those crazy cravings!
I can’t speak of ecstasy
In the presence of your fiery hair!
The interjection popped out with a misplaced full stop!
My angst
Forgot to hit backspace.
The thread stayed
Like a falling tear.
A full stop after the tear.
But I had no tears, I went, “Oh!”
In the presence of your fiery hair.
The typewriter lied!
You know I'm really happy
I like kissing your morning eyes.
See you Wednesday, hey, ll.
I type two lowercase lls.
And a handwritten signature.
III.
“Mario de Andrade!”
“Eh…”
I remembered the face his eyes his hair,
His hands so full of friendship for me.
But he was a stranger.
“It's been years, Mário...”
“Half a dozen, it was 1916.”
“I heard about you... in the papers. I've been following.”
“Huh.”
“You've changed a lot.”
“I'm stronger now.”
“Those insults were way too much.”
“A tad... What about you?”
“Well, I... But I can barely believe it, Mário de Andrade.”
“And our manoeuvres in Rio, d’you remember?... Those were the days!”
“Our days.”
He wanted to wrap me up in his drooping arms!
I muttered to myself,
Together we’d see if I’m right about who I am.
BUT HE WAS A STRANGER.
He said:
“I’m off to Caçapava.”4
“You didn’t request a transfer? The general will want it. I’m staying put.”
He shot me a glance as if ashamed, looking for someone else.
Then his gaze fell on the cramped horizons of Conselheiro Crispiniano street.5
Then his gaze fell on hands soiled by a battalion of bureaucratic shadows.
Then he stared at me. Eyes fixed.
“No. I’m off to Caçapava. Bye, Mário de Andrade.”
“Take care.”
What a relief!
I hate it when the dead come back.
They look too much like us!
XIV.
THE “HIGH MARCH”
All’s forgotten in soupy fog.
... one-two, one-two, one-two, one-two, one-two,
one-two, one-two, one-two
TREE
one-two, one-two, one-two, one-two,
one two
TREE
one-two, one-two, one-
TREE
two,
one-two, one-two, one-two, one-two,
one two
FIRST WHISTLE
one two,
one two,
one:
“Phwooooooh”
“Fuckin’ A!”
Notes:
1. Pau-brasil was a short-lived modernist movement founded by Oswald de Andrade in 1924. Losango cáqui was edited into its final form during that year.
2. Carioca is a demonym for a resident of Rio de Janeiro; similarly, Paulista is a resident of São Paulo. In a letter to artist, Anita Malfitti, M. de Andrade noted the score was 4 - 1.
3. A well-known area in Ancient Rome notorious for squalor and prostitution. In 1920s São Paulo, Suburra was slang for “red-light district”. Storyville might serve in the USA; Soho in the UK.
4. Caçapava is a small municipality in the state of São Paulo, north east of the city.
5. Rua Conselheiro Crispiniano is a major street in downtown São Paulo, near the Teatro Municipal de São Paulo, where Modern Art Week was inaugurated by Mário de Andrade in 1922.
Baz Martin Gibbons is a translator, poet, and author. His most recent publications include translations of Brazilian poets Augusto dos Anjos and Murilo Mendes by Poetry Foundation, The Antonym, Lunch Ticket, Mantis, and elsewhere; an extract from Lima Barreto’s novella O Cemitério dos Vivos is forthcoming in Asymptote. His translations of Murilo Mendes won the 2023 Gabo Prize for Literary Translation. He currently divides his time between Brazil and England while working on his MA in Creative Writing at Kingston University, London.
Mário de Andrade was a Brazilian poet, novelist, and critic. He published one of the first and most influential collections of modern Brazilian poetry, Paulicéia Desvairada, in 1922, the year he helped inaugurate Modern Art Week in São Paulo. His highly individual style tried to capture colloquial Brazilian speech rather than “correct” Portuguese. His prolific output, that includes novels, essays, poetry, journalism, criticism, and ethnographic studies, have had a considerable influence on modern Brazilian literature.