Poet: Pablo Antonio Cuadra

Nicaragua is said to be a country where poetry reigns supreme in the culture. I look forward to learning about the poets and poetries of such a nation. This morning I am reading from the work of Pablo Antonio Cuadra, who seems to me a kindred spirit. Consider this (in English translation) from his long poem "The Panama Tree" ("El Panama"):

Study this tree: Sterculia apetala
Sterculia carthaginensis.
Study the green hand of its palmate leaves with their three pronounced lobes.
Study its tiny campanulate flowers, which are yellow with purple spots,
and which smell like manure and a corral.
Study the five pale-green folicles of its fruit, open like an elegant little box,
and learn how to extract its five brilliant black seeds
wrapped in a yellow velvet whose bristling hairs will sting
your fingers like nettles.

Already, Cuadra has taught me how to pay attention to this tree. And I will. Soon.