"Brain, shake out thy water, dog-like." -- Ron Padgett

Thursday, October 31, 2013

The Little Mute Boy by Federico García Lorca

The Little Mute Boy
  by Federico García Lorca
translated by W. S. Merwin

The little boy was looking for his voice.
(The king of the crickets had it.)
In a drop of water
the little boy was looking for his voice.

I do not want it for speaking with;
I will make a ring of it
so that he may wear my silence
on his little finger

In a drop of water
the little boy was looking for his voice.

(The captive voice, far away,
put on a cricket's clothes.)





Activity:

LIST:
--item of clothing
--unusual colour
-sound in nature that fits this colour
--a continent or country or place
--a texture

WRITE:

POEM about JOURNEY for your LOST SENSE

-use your list (in order, if possible) to write a poem

Think about:

-how would you compensate without the sense?

-repetition of lines that talk about searching

-looking in unusual places that turn out to have some connection to the sense

--a wish to do something with the sense that might emphasize its loss or how much  you miss it

-what does the lost sense do without you?

(-what is the function of the parentheses in the original?}

-who's voice is the poem in? is it the same throughout?

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