The Poetry of Carlos Manuel Rivera by Bradley W. Davis, Davidson ’77 and Benito Pastoriza Iyodo

The Poetry of Carlos Manuel Rivera


Very few poets are able to navigate the treacherous waters of urban poetry and mysticism: Francisco de Quevedo, Federico García Lorca, Ernesto Cardenal. How does one go from the purity of Saint John of the Cross to the asperity of Miguel Piñero? How does one careen through the retruécano of Saint Teresa of Avila and the street-smart attitude of Piri Thomas? Carlos Manuel Rivera embarks on a poetic journey that flits on the classical breezes of the Spanish Renaissance (Garcilaso de la Vega, Fray Luis de Leon, Gutierre de Cetina) and rides the impetuous winds of modern US Latino poetry (Pedro Pietri, Miguel Algarín, Tato Laviera, Pat Mora). He does this with the awareness that historically readers tend to prefer such poets and traditions.
Unfortunately, academia has not always been able to examine or compare the verses of these “diametrically opposed” poets. Purity versus impurity. Tradition versus innovation. The same old debates and prejudices. The poetry of Carlos Manuel Rivera, in many ways, represents the link between these supposed opposites. His training as an actor has given him the tools to approach the immediacy of urban poetry. His discipline as a Spanish scholar has enabled him to embrace and understand the traditions of classical Hispanic poetry. And yes, the reader will be able to perceive the innovation of such a marriage: neologisms, a new syntax, and daring verses. His poetry represents a challenge for any translator. But we willingly accept this challenge, knowing that the poet-sailor understands the compass of his poetry. He is the spiritual son of Sor Juana Ines de la Cruz and the accomplice in arms of Lorna Dee Cervantes.

Vibrant poetry – no matter the country of origin, the language, syntax or century – is guided by knowledge of the past, the present we traverse and the stars on the horizon. Study, observation and passion for the word are the instruments that guide the poet, the sextant that aligns the celestial milestones, to arrive at distant harbors; some familiar and others filled with new realities. The poet learns to navigate the treacherous currents of creation employing the lessons of the past combined with the innovations of contemporary insight that extend to the elaboration of different levels of interpretation.
This layering effect of the poetry leads to the challenge of translating the poetry faithfully: reflecting the lexicon of the writing while portraying its poetic nature; creating the lexicon to match the innovative vocabulary while capturing the intrinsic clues of the syntax. The poetry in this selection brings together the traditional and the contemporary; taking us on a voyage that leads to tierra firme, where we see the connections between the point of departure and new ports-of-call.

Efectivamente

Efectivamente
A: El Fundador Movimiento del Poético
Nuyorican, Miguel Algarin


Aunque cautivo
de silencios
y armadura
de palabras,

recurro de horizontes,
palpitando de anémonas
el zarpazo ágil
de la presencia impactada.

No por ligeras penas,
mis adelantos
se sucumben ante la insignia.

No por permisos y lúceros
la ampliada zozobra de los líquidos
autoriza de aires
el obstinado fuego
que no anuncian
los silbidos de la tierra.

Quizás,
de neutros,
calmo
el regreso
de los soles que roen
de sombras

sin que los apaciguados gritos
colmen de la tarde
el provocado anhelo
de la brisa.

A lo mejor,
en rápidos amaneceres,
pierdo de lontananzas
los aguaceros
que en la noche aguardan

hasta que se consuma
el último rayo
que cesa todavía.

Capicu Community Interview: Professor / Poet Carlos Manuel Rivera

Capicu Community Interview: Professor / Poet Carlos Manuel Rivera

Capicu Community Interview: Professor/Poet Carlos Manuel Rivera

PaPo: Introductions are in order...tell us a little bit about yourself.

Carlos: I am Carlos Manuel “Carlitos” Rivera from Santurce, Puerto Rico. I grew up in Río Piedras, and studied at the University of Puerto, Río Piedras Campus from 1980-1987. I finished a Bachelor degree in Drama and Hispanic Studies. I come from the middle class, my parents were hard workers. My dad worked for years in the Water Company as a surveyor and my mom worked for private enterprises as an accounting clerk. Then, when I finished college, I went to Spain through a Study Abroad Program at NYU, obtaining a Masters degree in Hispanic Literature (1988). I came back Puerto Rico and started to be a Spanish college professor until today. After that, I moved to Tempe, Arizona where I obtained a Ph D in Spanish majoring in Latin American and Puerto Rican Theater at Arizona State University (2000). I lived in North Carolina working in Davidson College (2000-2008) near Charlotte. I moved New York City in 2008, now working in Bronx Community College (CUNY), as a Spanish Associate Professor.

PaPo: Aside from all that, what is the one thing you'd like for people to remember about you?

Carlos: Since 1979 I began to be an actor when I was 14 years working for community theater in San Juan, Puerto Rico. In 1980 when I studied in UPR, Rio Piedras, I started to write poetry and continued to perform my own poetry as well as acting for different professional productions. I did television, radio, and film until 1995 when I moved to Arizona. I have performed in Puerto Rico, USA, and Mexico, as well as I lectured about my performance work and my theater research in Dominican Republic, Chile, Colombia, Perú, and Spain.

PaPo: What are some of the inspirations and motivations behind your creative work?

Carlos: Some inspirations to me are: the classic, the modern, and the Avant Garde, especially the Spanish poets: Ramón Del Valle Inclán, Juan Ramón Jiménez and Federico García Lorca, and the Latin American writers: Jorge Luis Borges and Rubén Darío. From Puerto Rico my favorite are Luis Palés Matos, Julia de Burgos, Francisco Matos Paoli, Pedro Pietri, and Angela María Dávila, who also was my close friend until her death. My published book is Soplo mágicos disparates (I Blow Magical Non Senses), Orbis Press, 2004. I use pseudonym Carboinael Rixema, which I play with it as an imagined poet and writer within my creative and scholarly writing. Today my project is “ASI MI NATION”, which I recorded a CD contains various poems from the book as well as new poems. This project is about the Puerto Rican voiceless and subaltern, which were not included in the cultural and political national discourse because of their race, political vision, class, language, and gender. According to this, they affected the patriarchy and Creole bourgeoisie in order to construct and to imagine a homogeneous Puerto Rican Nation. The Puerto Rican Nation would have to be masculine, heterosexual, Hispanic (Spanish language without interference of the English), bourgeois, and with a race from European descendants. "The Other" within the Nation would be a Trouble Maker that cannot be accepted.

PaPo: Tell us about your first time performing... in that experience, what stood out?

Carlos: My first performance as an actor was in 1979 when I was 14 years. My first poetry performance of my own was in 1985 with the Puerto Rican poet, Daisy Mora de León in the University of Puerto Rico, Río Piedras. It was amazing and I love to perform. I think this is my life's heart and I’m very passionate about that.

PaPo: How did you first hear about the Capicu Open Mic?

Carlos: I met the people (of Capicu) by facebook and personally. They have become my FAMILY because I participated in their events as an open mic poet or a featured performer. They are so kind people, lovely , and friendly. Now, there is a big movement of Poetry, Spoken Words, Performance Art, Visual Art, Fiction Literature of many of us, led by the magnificent brothers, sisters , and colleagues, like: Charlie Vásquez, Raúl Ríos, La Bruja, Mike Geffner, Vanessa Mártir, Papo “Swiggity” Santiago, Divino Di Negro, Steven “Callejero”Maldonado, Mark Vigo, and Blaze A Page. Thanks to of all you, you are doing amazing work. Blessings to them!! VIVA NUESTRO TRABAJO y PA’ ALANTE LATINOS!!!

Elevacion!
PaPo Swiggity Santiago
Capicu Poetry & Cultural Showcase

With Pride in The Nationalist Party

With Pride
in The Nationalist Party
A: Manuel (Chu) Ramos Otero


Left Left
Left, right, Left.

Bitch,
si my Party is Nacional with pride.

If you question
where I’m coming from
my respond is
what you are searching.

Lo que se ve no se pregunta.
Valor y sacrificio
y su encuentro
en amplios radios
de mis trincheras.

With pride
la Patria
doesn’t deny
to whom is working for it.

The part is for everbody
and of everybody its parts.
From sins until silences.

I’m going to give you lo que me mides,
y si lo que me mides se convierte
en tus ansias,
slow down your moving, Baby.
Come,
para que la tumba
no se acomode a tus caprichos.

I am here
inventing
what you left
para que no se condicionen
límites ni horizontes en tus medallas.

All of those illusions formed by
your camaradas,
se dejaron
para que me grito
no condene lo que soy,
y no cabe dentro de tu Estado.

The Nation is my community,
my imaginaries
the unforgotten root
of your name.

The abject of my shadows,
which pronounces
de tu insensatez dormida,
y de tu impúdica magnificiencia
la codicia
de lo que no se ha fingido.

Here I am,
and as a germen
speaking out from my virus.

The death and the beatitud
be your own Punishment.

Left, Left
Left, right Left.
¡Viva Puerto Rico libre,
Viva Don Pedro Albizu Campos
with pride ¡

Vespertinas Alabanzas. A Miguel Algarín

Vespertinas alabanzas

A: Miguel Algarín, fundador del Movimiento Poético Niuyorican

Hoy cansado
de la casa,
sus precipicios
y sus laberintos

he decidido recomponer
mis aberturas
cruzando las medianías
que no solicitan
los aquietados.

Por esa siniestra raíz
del hondo canto,
por esa inquietud que
embarga el aspavido lucero
de la tarde
en lontananza,

recibo de tu sonrisa
ese maravilloso
marco
que sube
mi ánfora

y rodea mi sombra
de tus ilusiones
esperadas.

Y si por pálpitos
y deslumbradas azucenas,
las lunas y los aguaceros
se consumen,

desde mi cobertura
te seguiré alumbrando
sin que los heraldos anuncien
el acantilado sinsonte
de tus vespertinas
alabanzas.

21 de mayo de 2010.

Canto de Querubines

Canto de Querubines

A: Simply Rob
“ La vida es
la mismidad
y la mismidad es
un continuo cambio
a la eternidad”
Carboinael Rixema

Como un simple cliqueo
de un botón,
se desatan
lumbres, fósforos y cerillos.

Habría que prender
los andamios y las paredes
de ceremonias
que encasillen abejas
dentro de colmenas,
y límenes
de sus decibeles.

Era una grata
amnistía
que liberaba
a los de atrás,
y no fungía como
el último gemido
para que la zozobra riera
de sus maquinados heliotropos.

Parecía la palpitación
de hexámetros
que gritos y quimeras
colapsaban
del silencio pasmado
que enmarca su sonido.

No se relajaban
heraldos, ni cascabeles
regaban de proverbios.

No se llenaban ceniceros
de faroles,
incitando a la penumbra cuajada
como el níspero
que en su batir de piedra,
abre y cierra
el maná que fluye
de sus aleaciones.

Sólo se inauguraba
una cincelada de pájaros
que picoteaban de rapsodas
el interno trompo
de su inventada reminiscencia.

Sólo palmas
quedaban impregnadas
y los capullos alucinaban
rocíos como vuelta
no sincerada
de vertidas soledades
y de añorados saludos.

Sólo quedaba
la cháchara muda
que de manantiales
imaginaba diademas,
y como brisa
recobraba del misterio
curvas y escalones.

Sólo habría que rodar
por acantilados
donde la luna
no sintiera el púlpito,
y la mímica
enlutara
del sacrificio
el recriminado mandala.

Eran muchos los ejemplos:
ruinas,
pausas
y redundantes primaveras.

Eran varios los emisarios
con sus únicas inmediateces
abiertas a la deriva.

Eran cientos los de aquí
que en solicitud
asombraban
cada vez
el inhalado sollozo.

Eran tales
los que exaltaban
arroyuelos
que sirenas nunca silbaron
dentro de la insensatez
jubilada de su pesadilla.

Eran tantos
los que cumplen
sus amaneceres
en la verticalidad del llanto
que clavan articulaciones
y recomponen
de su precipicio elevado.

Eran algunos
como el hierro
que hablan de osadías
y vociferan
de su póstumo malestar
la abotonada sílaba
que se digna
de sus comenzares.

Era
sólo Èl,
el Querubín
quien con su canto
cumple trasfondos
desde el éter,
y recibe de albricias
sus labradas Bendiciones.

29 DE JUNIO DE 2010.

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