RUBEN DARIO, POET FROM NICARAGUA.

Margarita esta linda la mar,

Y el viento,

Lleva esencia sutil de azahar,

yo siento,

en el alma una alondra cantar

tu acento

Margarita te voy a contar un cuento:






This lovely piece of a poem called: A Margarita Debayle; was written by one of the most important poets of Latin America, Ruben Dario.

My aunt used to tell this poem to my little cousin, is like a fairy tale that he narrates to a 9 years old girl named Margarita. Is one of his most known poems, but not the only one. Let me tell you a little more about this great men.

Félix Rubén García Sarmiento, (January 18, 1867, Metapa, Matagalpa, Nicaragua – February 6, 1916, León, Nicaragua), known as Rubén Darío, was a Nicaraguan poet who initiated the Spanish-American literary movement known as modernismo (modernism) that flourished at the end of the 19th century. Darío has had a great and lasting influence on 20th-century Spanish literature and journalism. He has been praised as the "Prince of Castilian Letters" and undisputed father of the modernismo literary movement.

At birth, he was named Felix Ruben Garcia Sarmiento and later took the old family name, Dario. His parents divorced and he was adopted and raised by his godfather Colonel Felix Ramirez. Dubbed El Nino Poeta (the poet child), Dario began reading at the age of 3 and at 12 he was already publishing poems. He called his first three poems "La Fe", "Una Lagrima" and "El Desengano". In 1882 in an attempt to secure a scholarship to study in Europe, Dario read his poem, "El Libro" to conservative Nicaraguan authorities including President Joaquin Zavala. He was denied the scholarship because his poems were considered too liberal and officials feared a European education would further encourage his anti-religious sentiments. Instead, Dario traveled to El Salvador where he met the well-respected poet, Francisco Gavidia. Gavidia introduced Dario to the rhythmic structure of French poetry, which later became the cornerstone of Dario's revolutionary verses.



At the age of 19, Dario moved to Chile and dabbled in journalism. That year he also wrote his first novel, Emelina, which was unsuccessful. Nevertheless, his poetry received praise in competitions. In Chile, Dario was confronted with prejudice and racism due to the dark complexion of his skin, compared to that of the European influenced Chileans. Despite his disillusionment and despondency, Dario continued to be prolific in his writing and published some of his more popular works such as Azul, "Otonales", and "Primeras Notas".

In 1890 at the age of 24, Dario married Rafaela Contreras and a year later while living in Costa Rica his son, Ruben Dario Contreras was born. After fleeing from a military coup, the couple moved to Guatemala where he was recruited in 1892 to represent Nicaragua in festivity celebrating the four-century discovery of the New World. 

In 1893, Dario was appointed consulate in Columbia by President Miguel Antonio Caro and traveled to Panama and Argentina. In 1896 Dario published "Los Raros" poems about other writers such as Poe, Lautreamont, and Ibse who he likened himself to and who he considered his "twin souls". Later that same year he published "Prosas Profanas", a book of poems, which documented his trademark rhythmic style and modernist approach. At 31, Dario worked for La Nacion, an Argentinean newspaper and reported his impression about the Spanish during its war with the United States. While still working as a poet and journalist, he was named Ambassador of Nicaragua in Paris in 1903. Dario wrote several poems that exalted his Latino origins and culture such as "Cantos de Vida y Esperanza" and "Viaje a Nicaragua e Intermezzo Tropical". He published his autobiography in 1912.



This is Dario´s face in one of the bills in Nicaraguan currency, a hundred cordobas,

the biggest amount printed by the way!

Major Works

As a poet, journalist, and novelist, Dario remained a prolific writer through his life. He published his works between the years of 1879 and 1914. Dario gained recognition throughout Latin American and Spain with the 1905 publication of Azul, a full-length collection of his work. Azul introduced Dario as the spokesman of a new Latin American modernism. The collection incited a literary revolution because Dario replaced the complex Spanish verse with a simple, direct structure ("Ruben Dario 1867-1916"). His most celebrated book, "Cantos de Vida y Esperanza" was published in Spain in 1905. Although the book touches upon modern themes such as exoticism, it focuses primarily on Dario himself and his search for higher conscienceness. It serves as a retrospective account of the author and his Hispanic roots ("Ruben Dario"). Dario is also well recognized for his collection of poems, "Prosas Profanas", which cemented his talent as an engineer of words and language. Dario's work had a varied in inspiration and form. However, he always linked his work to a deep seeded pride in his Hispanic origins. In addition, Dario often wrote about his various travels and experiences.

Now, the important, i would like to share two of his poems,

FATALITY

The tree is happy because it is scarcely sentient;
the hard rock is happier still, it feels nothing:
there is no pain as great as being alive,
no burden heavier than that of conscious life.

To be, and to know nothing, and to lack a way,
and the dread of having been, and future terrors...
And the sure terror of being dead tomorrow,
and to suffer all through life and through the darkness,

and through what we do not know and hardly suspect...
And the flesh that temps us with bunches of cool grapes,
and the tomb that awaits us with its funeral sprays,
and not to know where we go,
nor whence we came!...

This one is very famous, and one of my favorites.

The next one is To Margarita Debayle, is the same as the little piece at the beginning of the post:
To Margarita Debayle
Margarita, how beautiful the sea is:
still and blue.
The orange blossom in the breezes
drifting through.
The skylark in its glory
has your accent too:
Here, Margarita, is a story
made for you.
A king there was and far away,
with a palace of diamonds
and a shopfront made of day.
He had a herd of elephants,

A kiosk, more, of malachite,
and a robe of rarest hue
also a princess who was light
of thought and beautiful as you.

But one afternoon the princess
saw high in the heavens appear
a star, and being mischievous,
resolved at once to bring it near.

It would form the centrepiece
of a brooch hung with verse, pearl,
feathers, flowers: a caprice
of course of a little girl.

But also, because a princess,
exquisite, delicate like you,
the others then cut irises
roses, asters: as girls do.

But, alas, our little one went far
across the sea, beneath the sky,
and all to cut the one white star
that saw her wondering and sigh.


She went beyond where the heavens are
and to the moon said, au revoir.
How naughty to have flown so far
without the permission of Papa.

She returned at last, and though gone
from the high heavens of accord,
still there hung about and shone
the soft brilliance of our Lord.

Which the king noted, said: you,
child, drive me past despair,
but what is that strange, shining dew
on your hands, your face, your hair?

She spoke the truth; her words shine
with the clear lightness of the air:
I went to seek what should be mine
in that blue immensity up there.

Are then the heavens for our display,
with things that you must touch?
You can be altogether too outré,
child, for God to like you much.

To hear that I am sorry, truly,
for I had no plans as such. But,
once across the windy sky and sea
I had so much that flower to cut.

Whereupon, in punishment,
the king said, I'd be much beholden
if you'd go this moment and consent
to return what you have stolen.

So sad was then our little princess
looking at her sweet flower of light,
until and smiling at her distress
there stood the Lord Jesus Christ.

Those fields are as I willed them,
and your rose but signatory
to the flowers up there that children
have in dreaming formed of me.

Again the king is laughing, brilliant
in his robes's rich royalty,
he troops the herd of elephant,
in their four hundred, by the sea.

Adored and delicate, the princess
is once more a little girl
who keeps for brooch the star and, yes,
the flowers, and the feathers, the pearl.

Beautiful, Margarita, the sea is,
still and blue:
with your sweet breath have all the breezes
blossomed too.

Now soon from me and far you'll be,
but, little one, stay true
to a gentle thought made a story
once for you.

Hope you like his poetry. He is one of the greatest men in Latin American Literature, and as you can see, he was from Central America.

Thanks for reading!

Sources:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rub%C3%A9n_Dar%C3%ADo

http://english.emory.edu/Bahri/Dario.html

http://allpoetry.com/poem/8541699-A_Margarita_Debayle__To_Margarita_Debayle_-by-Ruben_Dario

http://www.dariana.com/R_Dario_poems.html