Chilean writer, poet, playwright, who lives in the U.S. following twelve years in exile in Paris and a failed attempt to return to Chile in 1985, and a second exile in the Neterlands. A corresponding member of the Academia Norteamericana de la Lengua Española (ANLE), his poetry has appeared in literary magazines: RANLE, Multicultural Echoes (CSU-Chico), Enclave, (CUNY), Fonoteca de poesía, Revista Kametsa, and in several anthologies. Most recent publications: hombre de américa/man of the americas (Nueva York Poetry Press, 2020) and deseos longings j’aimerais tant (Ediciones Nuevo Espacio, 2020) a trilingual poetry collection.
Awards: Poetry Park (1989), Rotterdam, for “Dr. Zamenhofstraat”, lyrical prose; first runner up: International Latino Book Award 2018, best fiction book in translation Spanish/English, for And All of Us Were Actors, a Century of Light and Shadow, translation: A. Labinger.
decisiones
decidí
que debía cambiar la forma de mirar mi universo
que debía cambiar la forma de mirar mi vida
que debía borrar mi pasado
que debía ignorar mi presente
que debía regresar del futuro
decidí que era la hora de mi muerte
y decidí ahogarme en un verso
decisions
i decided
that i should change the way i observe my universe
that i should change the way i look at my life
that i should efface my past
that i should ignore my present
that i should return from the future
i decided that it was time to die
and resolved to drown in a verse
desconocido
escribo para ti
sin conocerte
escribo para ti
para encontrarme
escribo sobre el viento
sin poner un remitente
stranger
i write for you
without ever having met you
i write for you
to find myself
i write on the wind
with no return address
razón de ser
¿cuál es el sentido de mis versos?
pregunté
el viento
misericordioso
dio vuelta la página
raison d’être
what is the meaning of my verses?
i asked
the merciful wind
turned the page
Translations: Priscilla Gac-Artigas