Pausa
Octavio Paz
.
A la memoria de Pierre Reverdy
.
Llegan
unos cuantos pájaros
y una idea negra..
.
Pouse
.
Hulle het gekom
’n klompie voëls
en ’n swart gedagte:
geruis van bome,
gedruis van treine en motors,
kom of gaan hierdie oomblik?
.
Die stilte van die son
deurdring gelag en gekreun.
hy steek sy spies
diep in die gil van die klippe se klip.
.
Hart-son, kloppende klip,
bloedklip wat ’n vrug word:
wonde gaan oop sonder pyn,
my lewe vloei soos die lewe.
Uit Spaans vertaal deur De Waal Venter
Poetry Foundation
Pierre Reverdy was born in Narbonne, France in 1889. He set out on his career as a poet when he moved to Paris in 1910. Reverdy’s financially supportive father died a year later, so the aspiring poet was forced to make a living through his writing. He published his first small volume of poetry, Poems en prose, in 1915, and he continued to write steadily thereafter. Gradually, Reverdy became in literary circles, frequenting the avant-garde group consisting of such well-known artists and writers as Guillaume Apollinaire, Max Jacob, Pablo Picasso, Juan Gris, and Georges Braque. With these and other artists, Reverdy developed cubism and surrealism. In 1917 he founded the monthly literary review Nord-Sud, which featured work by the first cubists and surrealists—innovative writers such as Apollinaire, Jacob, Louis Aragon, André Breton, and Philippe Soupault. Reverdy’s many subsequent poetry collections include Cravates de chanvre (1922), Coeur de chene (1921), La Guitare endormie (1919), Les Jockeys camoufles (1918), and La Lucarne ovale (1916).
