Editorial

Abstract

Editorial Christopher W. Lemelin (bio) Marcel Proust once wrote, "The real voyage of discovery consists not in seeking new landscapes but in having new eyes." Certainly, discovering a poet for the first time gives the reader new eyes with which to see the world, and this new perspective is always exciting. This issue of Sirena provided me such a discovery: Cora Coralina. Coralina (pseudonym of Ana Lins dos Guimarães Peixoto Brêtas) was born in the city of Goiás in Brazil in 1889. Though she was poorly educated, she began writing poetry at the age of 14. Still her first book, Poems from the Alleys of Goiás and Other Stories, was published more than sixty years later, in 1965. Though there is little information available on Coralina in English, what I have read points to a fascinating and unusual life. It is her poems, however, that provide a better window onto Cora Coralina's life. Many of the poems included here focus on the reality of Coralina's world-her hometown of Goiás, stones in the landscape, hands roughened by daily work, the harvest, sowing-soberly presenting the everyday in direct, expressive images. Yet Carolina transforms these images into marks of achievement, hope, sorrow and joy: "I am the stem of these ordinary vines," she writes, "sprung from the cracks between the stones. Wild. Stubborn. Indomitable. Cut. Sliced. Abused. Trodden down. And coming back to life again." Her work also points to the craft of poetry, which hews meaning from the world; she has "lifted up the rough-hewn stone" of her poetry from the stony landscape around her. In her poetry, Coralina strove to discover the meaning in her everyday world, and the poetic laboratory is as fertile a location for discovery as any. As Northrop Frye once noted, "Just as a new scientific discovery manifests something that was already latent in the order of nature,… so the new poem manifests something that was already latent in the order of words." Coralina's poetry provides just that kind of discovery, making the universal out of the everyday. In addition to the sizable section of Cora Coralina's poetry, Sirena is proud to publish an article on Coralina's poetry by well-known Coralina scholar Darcy França Denófrio. Finally, this issue of Sirena also includes poetry of Steve Gehrke, Utz Rachowski, and Alexei Tsvetkov, all of whom participated in last fall's Semana poética at Dickinson College. The art in this issue is by Massimiliano Tommaso Rezza, whose intriguing photograph graced the cover of Sirena 2007:1. I hope that our readers will find many discoveries of their own in these pages. [End Page 6] Editorial Christopher W. Lemelin (bio) Marcel Proust una vez escribió, "El viaje auténtico de descubrimiento consiste no en buscar nuevos paisajes sino en tener nuevos ojos" Ciertamente, descubrir un poeta por la premiera vez da al lector nuevos ojos con los cuales a ver el mundo, y esta nueva perspectiva es siempre emocionante. Este número de Sirena me proporcionó tal descubrimiento: Cora Coralina. Coralina (el pseudónimo de Ana Lins dos Guimarães Peixoto Brêtas) nació en la ciudad de Goiás en Brasil en 1889. Aunque no tuve educación avanzada, empezó a escribir la poesía a la edad de 14 años. No obstante, su premiero libro, Poemas dos Becos de Goiás e Estórias Mais, fue publicado más de 60 años después, en 1965. Aunque hay poco información sobre Cora Coralina en inglés, lo que he leído indica una vida fascinante y original. Es sus poems, sin embargo, que le proporcionan una mejor ventana en la vida de Cora Coralina. Muchos de los poemas incluidos aquí se enfocan en la realidad del mundo de Coralina-su ciudad de Goiás, piedras en el paisaje, las manos ásperas de trabajo, la cosecha, la época de la siembra-sobriemente presentando la vida cotidiana en las imagenes directas y expresivas. Pero Carolina transforma estas imagenes en las marcas de éxito, de esperanza, de pena, y de alegría. "Yo soy el tallo de esas enredaderas sin clase...