Selecting just five among so many beautiful poems is no easy task, especially when it comes to the work of Carlos Drummond de Andrade, considered the greatest Brazilian poet of the 20th century. Certainly the poet would refuse the epithet, but it is unquestionable that the illustrious Itabira citizen is one of the most beloved and visited writers in our Brazilian Literature.
Five poems that are not always among the most remembered and in an attempt to undo the injustice they hide from the general public less paraphrased verses, we rescue poems for you that do not fit in the superficiality of the countless collections published in the Internet. For us, and now for you, the essentials of Carlos Drummond de Andrade. Good reading!
The poet left unpublished books, published posthumously by Editora Record: the reverse of things, girl lying on the grass, the natural loveandfarewell **
Communion
All my dead were standing in a circle
me in the center.
None had a face. were recognizable
by the body expression and by what they said
in the silence of your clothes beyond fashion
and fabrics; unadvertised clothes
nor sold.
None had a face. what they said
no answer,
stood, still, suspended in the hall, object
dense, quiet.
I noticed an empty spot on the wheel.
I slowly went to occupy it.
All faces appeared, lit up.
comfort on the beach
Come on, don't cry.
Childhood is lost.
The youth is lost.
But life was not lost.
The first love has passed.
The second love has passed.
The third love has passed.
But the heart continues.
You lost your best friend.
You haven't tried any trip.
You have no car, ship, land.
But you have a dog.
some harsh words,
in a still voice, they beat you.
Never, never heal.
But what about the mood?
Injustice is not resolved.
in the shadow of the wrong world
you muttered a timid protest.
But others will come.
All in all, you should
drop yourself, once and for all, into the waters.
Are you naked in the sand, in the wind…
Sleep, my son.
Carlos Drummond de Andrade: Two hands and the feeling of the world ***
Absence
For a long time I thought that absence is lacking.
And he regretted, ignorant, the lack.
Today I don't regret it.
There is no shortage in absence.
The absence is a being in me.
And I feel her, white, so close, snuggled in my arms,
that I laugh and dance and invent joyful exclamations,
because the absence, this assimilated absence,
no one steals it from me anymore.
the time of tiredness
The things we love,
the people we love
they are eternal up to a point.
last variable infinity
at the limit of our power
of breathing eternity.
To think about them is to think that they never end,
give them granite frame.
From another matter they become, absolute,
in another (greater) reality.
They start to fade when we get tired,
and we all get tired, for one or another itinerary,
to inhale the resin of the eternal.
We no longer intend them to be imperishable.
We restore each being and thing to its precarious condition,
we demote love to the state of usefulness.
From the eternal dream is this acrid enjoyment
in the mouth or in the mind, I don't know, maybe in the air.
Forever
why God allows
that mothers leave?
Mom has no limit,
it's time without time,
light that doesn't go out
when the wind blows
and rain falls,
hidden velvet
on wrinkled skin,
pure water, pure air,
pure thought.
dying happens
with what is brief and passes
leaving no trace.
Mother, in his grace,
it's eternity.
why God remembers
- deep mystery -
to take it out one day?
Were I King of the World,
lowered a law:
Mother never dies,
mother will always stay
with your son
and he, old though,
will be small
made from corn grain.
Carlos Drummond de Andrade
*The image that illustrates this article is on the cover of Antologia Poética, Polygram/Philips, 1978.
**The image that illustrates the core of the article was taken from book covers by Carlos Drummond de Andrade published by Editora Record.
***The image that illustrates the core of the article is on the cover of the book Mestres da Literatura: Carlos Drummond de Andrade, by writer Antonieta Cunha, Editora Moderna.
***Image credits: Shutterstock and Georgios Kollides
By Luana Castro
Graduated in Letters
Source: Brazil School - https://brasilescola.uol.com.br/literatura/o-essencial-carlos-drummond-andrade.htm