Sunday Bloody Sunday

By Jorgenrique Adoumtrans. Katherine M. Hedeen and Víctor Rodríguez Núñez

vallejo knows the sunday sepulcher is bigmouthed too lizardly greedyguts of what then is us what’s left of the ragdoll jostled all week the dream we postpone or diminish ourselves with this disactivity of postliving used to the who knows the hows the what a shames the world’s been a sunday afternoon for years now the station from where you come back to what you are every time the airports where the staybehinds less lessen where everywhere god is pure echo of that bisyllable that hurts me deepinside (sundayly facedown down which face you’re dying on someone so slowly) thank goodness beginning monday you’ll think about something else

Prepoemas en postespañol y otros poemas // prepoems in postspanish and other poems

For the rest of my life, I will be grateful to these translators! Jorgenrique Adoum has an extraordinary landscape for us to meet, explore “in the subsoul or the dislife” and to know poets, poetry, as new all over again. The strength of poetry has never been more evident!

—CA Conrad, author of While Standing in Line for Death

 

Jorgenrique Adoum, widely-recognized as the most important Ecuadorian intellectual of the twentieth century, was an award-winning poet, novelist, essayist, and playwright. Of Lebanese descent, he was born in the Andean town of Ambato in 1926. During his lifetime, he published 14 books of poetry. He belonged to a pioneering and yet often overlooked group of Spanish American poets known as “conversacionalistas.” who emphasize the orality of language, make use of the languages of the social sciences and mass media, and innovate by challenging poetic limits and by requiring an active reader, one considered a co-author. Adoum spent much of the sixties, seventies, and eighties in exile, mainly in Paris, returning to Ecuador in 1987, where he continued to write. He died in Quito in 2009 and is buried at the Chapel of Man, the museum and cultural center created by his friend, the outstanding visual artist, Oswaldo Guayasamín.

Katherine M. Hedeen’s latest translations include prepoems in postspanish and other poems by Jorgenrique Adoum (Action Books) and from a red barn by Víctor Rodríguez Núñez (co•im•press). She is a Professor of Spanish at Kenyon College, a Managing Editor of Action Books, and the Poetry in Translation Editor at the Kenyon Review. More info: www.katherinemhedeen.com

Víctor Rodríguez Núñez (Havana, 1955) is one of Cuba’s most outstanding and celebrated contemporary writers, with over fifty collections of his poetry published throughout the world. He has been the recipient of major awards in the Spanish-speaking region, including, in 2015, the coveted Loewe Prize. His selected poems have been translated into over a dozen languages. His latest book in English translation is from a red barn (tr. K. Hedeen, co•im•press, 2020). He divides his time between Gambier, Ohio, where he is a Professor of Spanish at Kenyon College, and Havana, Cuba. More info: www.victorrodrigueznunez.com

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