"Salamander (La Salamandre)", by Pierre Roche

Et ustus fortiter.

Goliard Songs

 

I live far from the great museums. I overlay the din of Tegucigalpa with Guernica. It’s practically impossible to copy a Fragonard, his verdure an undeserved hope. Here, the green rusts out like Neruda’s autograph. Only the traffic light takes aim at me. It’s the sight of an all-knowing sniper.

I live far from the Luxembourg Gardens; the more distant the train landscapes the more the lead hits my pupil. In the Carmina Burana it was an omen: to live removed from the Buddhist temples, from the hallways where a co-conspiring Heraclitus cries. I won’t die near the graveyard by the sea, near the whiteness that begins again in the waves. A watercolor trembles above the Tisa, but fifteen hundred leagues away. So remote Monet’s ponds, Rimbaud’s vowels, the kaleidoscope of the great libraries.  I’m twenty-six years from Klimt’s yellows and in the opposite direction to beauty. I live far from symphonic orchestras, tulip-covered fields, the blue of imperial porcelain, every single windmill.

My colors are different. With them I must uphold my life.

Rolando Kattan
Rolando Kattan is a prize-winning poet, publisher, and cultural activist. He has published ten books of poetry and his work has received prestigious awards in the Spanish-speaking world, including the Claudio Rodríguez Poetry Prize (2024) and the Casa de América Poetry Prize (2021), both in Spain. His poetry has been translated and published in fifteen languages and he has been invited to read throughout the world, in more than fifty countries. He is the editor of two independent poetry presses in Honduras: Mano Nostra and Cisne Negro. He was co-organizer of the Honduran literacy project, Leer es Fiesta, which distributed twelve books at no cost to over 5000 readers. He regularly organizes cultural events in Tegucigalpa. He is a member of both the Royal Spanish Academy and the Honduran Academy of Language.  His collection Bullet-Proof, translated into English by Katherine Hedeen and Víctor Rodríguez Núñez (Eulalia Books, 2026), is forthcoming.

Katherine M. Hedeen
Katherine M. Hedeen is a prize-winning translator of poetry and an essayist. A specialist in Latin American poetry, she has translated over thirty books of some of the most respected voices from the region into English. Her work has been a finalist for both the Best Translated Book Award and the National Translation Award. She is a recipient of the University of Wisconsin’s inaugural Poetry in Translation Prize, two NEA Translation Grants, and a PEN Translates award in the UK. She is an editor of the transnational and translational press, Action Books. She resides in Ohio, where she is Professor of Spanish at Kenyon College, and Havana, Cuba. More information: www.katherinemhedeen.com

Victor Rodriguez Nunez
Víctor Rodríguez Núñez (Havana, 1955) is one of Cuba’s most outstanding and celebrated contemporary writers, with over one hundred editions of poetry published throughout the world. He has been the recipient of major awards in the Spanish-speaking region. His selected poems have been translated into over fifteen languages and he has read his poetry in more than fifty countries. He divides his time between Gambier, Ohio, where he is Professor Emeritus of Spanish at Kenyon College, and Havana, Cuba. More info: www.victorrodrigueznunez.com