The Alphabet in the Park: Selected Poems

by Adélia Prado

This is the first book published in English by of the work of Brazilian poet Adelia Prado. Incorporating poems published over the past fifteen years, The Alphabet in the Park is a book of passion and intelligence, wit and instinct. These are poems about human concerns, especially those of women, about living in one's body and out of it, about the physical but also the spiritual and the imaginative life. Prado also writes about ordinary matters; she insists that the human experience is both mystical and carnal. To Prado these are not contradictory: "It's the soul that's erotic," she writes.

As Ellen Watson says in her introduction, "Adelia Prados poetry is a poetry of abundance. These poems overflow with the humble, grand, various stuff of daily life - necklaces, bicycles, fish; saints and prostitutes and presidents; innumerable chickens and musical instruments...And, seemingly at every turn, there is food." But also, an abundance of dark things, cancer, death, greed. These are poems of appetite, all kinds.

Genres: Poetry, Love

80 pages, Paperback

First published May 1, 1990

About the author

Adélia Luzia Prado Freitas, is a Brazilian writer and poet. Started writing at the age of 40 which is relatively late in life for a poet. Although much of her outlook is religious, deeply Catholic, her works are often about the body.
Adélia Prado's poems were translated into English by Ellen Watson and published in a book entitled, The Alphabet in the Park. (Wesleyan University Press, 1990).

From Wikipedia

Reviews

[Edita · Rating 5 out of 5]

I’m looking for the saddest thing, which once found
will never be lost again, because it will follow me
more loyal than a dog, the ghost
of a dog, sadness beyond words.
*
I write a poem and delude myself that I’ve escaped sadness.
I merely make it rhythmic, lighter perhaps.
I do my best to make it beautiful, bearable,
and for that reasonless reason I cry some more.
*
This is all I want—
to sit in the sun until my hide is wrinkled.
But the sun, too, will disappear behind the hill,
night comes and passes over me;
far from mirrors, I feed dreams
of fame and travel, extraordinary men
offering me necklaces, words
that can be eaten, they're so sweet,
so warm, so corporeal.
The trellis sags with flowers,
I sleep a drunken sleep,
judging the beauty of the world negligible,
craving something that neither dies nor withers,
is neither tall nor distant,
nor avoids meeting my hard, ravenous look.
Unmoving beauty:
the face of God, which will kill my hunger.

[Hind · Rating 4 out of 5]

Day escapes me, the hour, all the hours;
I write a poem and delude myself that I've escaped sadness.
I merely make it rhythmic, lighter perhaps.
I do my best to make it beautiful, bearable,
and for that reasonless reason I cry some more.

[Paul · Rating 3 out of 5]

These poems are somewhat hit or miss for me, but her best ones have fresh imagery and voice. The last line of one where she describes the origin of words as 'a live fish in your hand: pure terror" has always stuck with me.

[Lindsey · Rating 2 out of 5]

Favorites included:
"Dysrhythmia"
"Not Even One Line in December"
"Denouement"

I felt like some things may have been lost on me in translation. "Dysrhythmia," which opens the collection, threw me for such a loop that I feel like I may have expected too much of the rest of the selection.

[Peyton · Rating 4 out of 5]

9/10 i think, the poems may seem simple but i read them at just the right time and i love the voice in her writing

[whoever whenever · Rating 5 out of 5]

Gorgeous and wild. This is my favorite kind of free verse

[~~ · Rating 3 out of 5]

3.5 stars.

Adelia Prado's poems are sensual and alive. They are precise, they are windows and dirt warm with sunlight. You will want to sit in a kitchen with her, in the heat of candles, and hear her. You will not wish to speak, only to see her. When you leave her house, you will hear the birds better. The streets will be lit differently. A boy will run down an alley. You will greet him with a voice that is yours, but wasn’t before. It is the gift of poetry. It alters us. It makes us more humane, attentive, alive. In this way, poetry is always political, for it gives one strength and so, becomes a means of surviving.

"Serenade"

Some night under a pale moon and geraniums
he would come with his incredible hands and mouth
to play the flute in the garden.
I am beginning to despair
and can see only two choices:
either go crazy or turn holy.
I, who reject and reprove
anything that's not natural as blood and veins,
discover that I cry daily,
my hair saddened, strand by strand,
my skin attacked by indecision.
When he comes, for it's clear that he's coming,
how will I go out onto the balcony without my youth?
He and the moon and the geraniums will be the same–
only women of all things grow old.
How will I open the window, unless I'm crazy?
How will I close it, unless I'm holy?

[Vicki · Rating 4 out of 5]

This collection, selecting from three of Brazilian poet Adelia Prado's collections from the 1970s and 80s and sensitively translated by Ellen Watson, is a revelation. By turns earthy and sensual, then spiritual and acutely conscious of the presence of God (although not without skepticism), then bitter, then joyous, Prado captures with distinctive brio and energy the travails and triumphs of a life lived fully and fearlessly.

[Sarah · Rating 3 out of 5]

Some good stuff - natural, honest, passionate - but I had been hoping to explode into flames, and I didn't explode into flames.

[Tatyana · Rating 5 out of 5]

"The Spirit of God is merciful,
He’s going to abandon me so I can rest,
He’s going to let me sleep."
- from "Vigil"

"What did I do wrong
that I feel like being dead ?"
- from "Vigil"

"How lovely you are !
I want to excavate you until I find
where you keep so much feeling."
- from “Love in the Ether”

[Matt Miles · Rating 5 out of 5]

Prado’s poems seamlessly combine all the paradoxes of existence into each individual poem, earning their quiet power and deserving as many re-reads as humanly possible.

[Katie Farris · Rating 5 out of 5]

Watson’s translation feels effortless and communicates Prado’s lusty, playful faith and her extraordinary poetic craft. Delicious.

[Jenna King · Rating 5 out of 5]

Adélia Prado is a masterful poet & her work breathes honesty and truths that both brought me joy and absolutely wrecked me

[Krissy · Rating 5 out of 5]

I only read this book because it was assigned in my Lit class, but these poems are so powerful that I now want to read more Adelia Prado. I haven't even read any poetry in years, and I'm not especially intelligent or educated but these poems would speak to anyone.
far from mirrors, I feed dreams
of fame and travel, extraordinary men
offering me necklaces, words
that can be eaten, they're so sweet
so warm, so corporeal.
The trellis sags with flowers.
I sleep a drunken sleep,
judging the beauty of the world negligible,
craving something that neither dies nor withers,
is neither tall nor distant,
nor avoids meeting my hard, ravenous look.
Unmoving beauty:
the face of God, which will kill my hunger. (from the poem Mobiles)

[Sasha · Rating 5 out of 5]

"If I feel physically as if the top of my head were taken off, I know that is poetry. These are the only way I know it. Is there any other way?" - Emily Dickinson

"Poetry will save me. I won’t tell this to the four winds
because I’m frightened of experts, excommunication,
afraid of shocking the fainthearted. But not of God.
What is poetry, if not His face touched
by the brutality of things?"

- Adélia Prado, GUIDE.

So many mic drops in this book. So much top-of-the-head-taken-off.

[Danel Turel · Rating 4 out of 5]

Good.

[Morbid Swither · Rating 5 out of 5]

Please read Adelia Prado.

[Rebecca Yang · Rating 5 out of 5]

hungry desperate and grief-ridden: prado stunned me with her honesty and faith

[hh · Rating 3 out of 5]

no portuguese included. uneven for me in english.