The Mystical Rose: Selected Poems

by Adélia Prado

Adelia Prado was 'discovered' when she was nearly 40 by Brazil's foremost modern poet, Carlos Drummond de Andrade, who was astonished to read her 'phenomenal' poems, launching her literary career with his announcement that St Francis was dictating verses to a housewife in the provincial backwater of Minas Gerais. Psychiatrists in droves made the pilgrimage to Divinópolis to delve into the psyche of this devout Catholic who wrote startlingly pungent poems of and from the body; they were politely served coffee and sent back to the city. After publishing her first collection, Baggage, in 1976, she went on to become one of Brazil's best-loved poets, awarded the Griffin Lifetime Achievement Award in 2014. Adelia Prado's poetry combines passion and intelligence, wit and instinct. Her poems are 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; about living in two worlds simultaneously: the spiritual and the material. She also writes about ordinary matters, insisting that the human experience is both mystical and carnal. For her these are not contradictory: 'It's the soul that's erotic,' she writes. 'Sometimes other poets and criti analyse my writing, and they've said how, even though the text is made of colloquial and everyday language, the work goes to transcendental issues. I don't know, I don't explain things; I simply do what I do. I only know how to write about concrete, immediate and commonplace things. But these commonplace things show me their metaphysical nature. I can only see the metaphysical, the divine, through the concrete and the human.' 'Brazil has produced what might seem impossible: a really sexy, mystical, Catholic poet' - Robert Hass.

Genres: Poetry, Brazil

192 pages, Kindle Edition

First published January 29, 2015

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 4 out of 5]

I pruned the rosebush at the perfect moment
and left town for days,
having learned once and for all
to wait biblically,
everything in its time.
One day I opened the window, and there it was
as I’d never seen it before,
studded
with buds,
some already with that pale rose
peeking out between sepals,
clusters of living jewels.
My bad back,
my disappointment with the limits of time,
my enormous effort to be understood –
all turned to dust
before this recurrent miracle.
The cyclical, perceptible roses
have made themselves marvelous.
No one can dissuade me
from what – beyond the structure of reason –
I knew all at once:
mercy is intact.
Billowing greed,
pummeling fists,
high-pitched fury –
nothing can hold back gold corollas
or – believe me – fragrance.
Because it’s springtime.

[Lily Ruban · Rating 5 out of 5]

"in no time at all
things will begin to phosphoresce in the forest,
God's servant leaves her cell nightly
and walks down the road
because God feels like a stroll
and she can walk"

"must I experience at least minimal discomfort and strangeness
in order to remain human?"

"Everything in the world is perfect
and death is love"

"When my mother lay dying, even my weeping contained a rainbow,
black will highlight my fair hair"

"Come, Jonathan,
bring flowers for my mother
and a pair of handcuffs for me".

"To me, writing is a religion".

"Words, I want them first as things".

[Sarah Foulc · Rating 3 out of 5]

3.5 — some poems in this collection I LOVED, but most of them I didn’t feel much, reading. I guess one should always be a little more indulgent on translations, it is different, not the original and sounds don’t sound the same. It’s poetry after all. But yes, some of these poems esp near the end where it’s all about Jonathan I was a bit tired of to be honest 😅😅😅

Anyway, to end this on a positive note, here’s my favourite poem from the lot:

Seduction

Poetry catches me with her toothed wheel
and forces me to listen, stock-still,
to her extravagant discourse.
Poetry embraces me behind the garden wall, she picks up
her skirt and let’s me see, loving and loony.
Bad things happen, I tell her,
I, too, am a child of God,
allow me my despair.
Her answer is to draw her hot tongue
across my neck;
she says rod to calm me,
she says stone, geometry,
she gets careless and turns tender,
I take advantage and sneak off.
I run and she runs faster,
I yell and she yells louder,
seven demons stronger.
She snatched me, making deep grooves,
from tip to toe.
Poetry’s toothed wheel is made of steel.

[payshens · Rating 3 out of 5]

I am beginning to despair
and can see only two choices:
either go crazy or turn holy.

Nature is obedient and happy,
Nature follows its own laws,
              it doesn’t flow from God.
But me – what am I?

[Briana · Rating 5 out of 5]

What beauty Adélia writes. I’ve been carting her around for the better part of the summer, stuck on her words like, “and meanwhile everything is so small. Compared to my heart's desire the sea is a drop.” And, “Why all this weight on my shoulders? I didn’t ask to be the inspector of the world.” She reminds me of a little bit of Lucia Berlin in some poems and others like Clarice Lispector. I don’t really know how to review or even really reflect on poetry. Somehow poetry seems like the most personal form of literature. I thought it was cool to learn she got “success” or started writing poetry at 40. I sort of love writers who come into it later in life. There is such honesty in these poems. Echoes of my own thoughts and ones I’ve heard before. There is a lot of talking to and asking God out loud, how? And why? Which I find both endearing and relatable. Poetry stirs something different and unique in my heart— it hits a different chord. It feels like the truest way to play with words. The imagery Adélia created! I sort of like how truth is the objective but does not rely on facts. Poetry relies on painting or maybe that’s what Adélia feels like to me— a painting, a dance, a dusk summer night, moonlight, a spaghetti strap maxi dress after a long day at the beach. A cocktail, a head tossed back in laughter, a steaming kiss in the shadows of the street, a heartbreak, a longing, a deep question inside all of us.

[Matt Miles · Rating 5 out of 5]

These poems capture the simple, profound, sacred, and profane elements of life, allow them all to intersect, and reveal beauty in the process.

[scarlettraces · Rating 4 out of 5]

In the manner of Selima Hill only with less studied oddity and more God.

[Neil · Rating 3 out of 5]

In a nutshell there is an undeniable brilliance in the way AP connects words, bends and blends language constructs and draws together everyday details and profound concepts BUT as an atheist the profusion of numinous incantations left me completely unmoved - I couldn't relate to any of it, these lines meant absolutely nothing to me on any level; on that basis I don't think I can't recommend it to anyone who doesn't have a "relationship with god." - I'd say 75% of the poetry here relates to faith. The other problem is the sexual fervency - only in that the name "Jonathan" starts appearing in almost every poem about 30-40% of the way into the book and doesn't relent - the problem is that there is no explanation in the introduction (or anywhere in the book or across the internet AFAICS) about who Jonathan is - it could simply be a figurative character, a poetic construct - but the name appears in so many poems I really can't fathom how the translator or editor didn't see fit to offer any insight (I contacted the publisher but so far, haven't received a reply - I doubt I will as they didn't respond to a previous message I sent about some minor errors in the book). Having said all this, the poetry writer and reader in me really did marvel at a lot of the poetry and thrill at her bold, unrestrained and passionate way with words.

Perhaps I'll come back and add more examples and details to this review and revise the rating.