Sonora

by Chus Pato, Erín Moure (Translator)

Bilingual edition: Galician and EnglishSonora holds the resonance of human life facing time itself, and an inevitable finality of voice. Here the voice is that of a feminine lineage; the death faced most centrally is that of the poet’s mother, in a book dedicated to her daughters. Crucially, it includes the sound waves of her native language, the language of both her parents, its history of endurance, as well as the granitic fissures and domes of the place where this language, Galician, is spoken. This lineage cherishes others too, poets who keep Galician alive, and keep Chus Pato alive, even (but we hope not) on the path to planetary extinction: thus poems dedicated to Xabier Cordal, Alba Cid, Manuel Igrexas, Gonzalo Hermo, Oriana Méndez. Sonorous indeed is this voice of a woman who faces the flight of time and the planetary present, so that we too —wherever we live — can face language, place, and future. Pato’s poetry makes all of us more fiercely and humanly alive.

226 pages, Paperback

Published March 5, 2026

About the author

Licenciada en Xeografía e Historia pola Universidade de Santiago de Compostela (1973), fixo traballos de investigación na súa especialidade como O movimento obreiro na provincia de Ourense. Exerce como profesora de ensino secundario (Xeografía e Historia) no IES Ramón María Aller Ulloa de Lalín. Pertence a varias agrupacións tanto de índole literaria (o PEN Club) coma político-social (Redes Escarlata). Foi cabeza de lista da Frente Popular Galega pola provincia de Ourense en varias ocasións. Foi elixida académica de número da Real Academia Galega no pleno do 5 de novembro de 2016.[1]