MICHAEL BENEDIKT [9504]

Michael Benedikt

Michael Benedikt nació en 1935 en New York City, EE.UU. Recibió su licenciatura en la Universidad de Nueva York y obtuvo una Maestría en Literatura Inglesa de la Universidad de Columbia. Fue asistente editorial de Prensa desde 1959 a 1962, y en 1963-64 se desempeñó como Jefe de Redacción de las revistas literarias Locus Solus.

Antes de publicar su primer libro de poesía, Benedikt co-editó tres antologías de 20th Century Theatre poética desde el extranjero: francés moderno Teatro: La Vanguardia, el dadaísmo, el surrealismo(1964); posguerra alemana Teatro (1966) y Modern Theatre español(1967). Su antología de obras de teatro del siglo XX de América, Experimento Theatre, fue publicado en 1968. Es también el editor de dos antologías históricas de la poesía del siglo XX: la poesía del surrealismo (1974), y el poema en prosa: una antología Internacional (1976).

Obra:

The Badminton at Great Barrington; or Gustave Mahler & The Chattanooga Choo-Choo (University of Pittsburgh Press, l980)--a sequence of poems about the joys & sorrows of love; & with Wesleyan University Press Night Cries (prose poems, l976); Mole Notes (prose poems, l971); Sky (l970); and The Body (l968). His work appears in ca. 70 anthologies of US poetry.  Relatively recent poetry in Agni, Iowa Review, Jerusalem Review, Lips, Michigan Quarterly Review, The New Republic, New York Quarterly, Partisan Review, The Paris Review & Washington Square.

Amor Divino

Un LABIO que había permanecido estólido, ahora se mueve

Gradual en torno al lado de la cabeza

Como ojo

El ojo se torció en la punta del dedo de alguien, y gira

Alrededor del sol, su oreja,

Y el cerebro arriba sobre el lago del rostro-

Cerca de la catarata del cuerpo-

Como cúmulo agrandado antes de una tormenta:

Un sonido 

Que crece gradualmente en el Este

Conduciéndolo todo antes de esto: ganado y arco iris y amantes

Barridos

A la mesa del cuerpo a la que cinco hombres y dos mujeres

Se han sentado casualmente a comer

Versión de Pedro Gandía

[Poems from Part I of The Body]

AIR

Air, air, you're the distantmost thing I know. 

Not even the songs of whales tracing patterns 

On top of or beneath the sea, are more inscrutable or beautiful, to me; 

You carry sails of travelers to interesting places 

And adventurers, sailors, or just plain traders; 

You encourage the bicyclist to mount his apparatus 

And you're ever-present around swimming-pools 

So that when the excessively-dedicated swimmer may emerge

From the water an instant, he'll freeze; 

And air, you're famous for hanging around fetid places 

Also, ready to clear the dank atmosphere 

With a breath of yourself--I’ve found you in 

The slums of the intellect even, about to puff 

When the mind’s tired after too much travel, 

Or choking after contact with unthinking people 

And you’re present in poems rescuing one when one’s feeling somewhat stifled 

Poised like a bouquet there, sprightly and colorful.

THE AMBITIOUS LUMP

[Poem On Extended Vacation. To Return Anon]

THE CITIES

Tired of poultry, the experimental chemist

Slouched under the laboratory light.

His assistant, Phyllis, for whom he had

An eye, had crept out at exactly five

Leaving the mad old man there

Beneath all the flourescent tubes.

Soon, through the window, the lunar

Rays shone. The landscape brilliantly

Lit up, by the reflections from frost.

But the old man lay among the poultry

Droppings, a victim, as local police termed it,

Of  "Desperate, Unrequited Love."

Phyllis' life was changed by the event.

No sooner had she attended Georg's

Funeral, than she abandoned her staid old ways.

Parties all night, festivals at which

Her nudity glittered with the aspics,

Poetry readings in little cellar bars!

--Her life was changed. She bought a dog.

In the park, for free, they

Fondled her near The Fountain. Enough

Had soon happened to fill a lifetime.

Then, tired of the Arts & Sciences of Men,

Phyllis crept home to gentle Peoria.

In Peoria, Phyllis was somehow unsatisfied.

Her restless ways became apparent

To her parents, and one day, as she

Was returning from the corner soda parlor

With the local plumber, her parents

Drew her aside. "Our dear Phyll," they

Said, "you are insufficiently happy here.

You are not the little girl we knew

Who went wincing up to the attic

Tenderly, when struck, and would not

Come down for a week; you seem more hip

Now, and very unlikely to stay

More than an unhappy few months more here.

Why don't you get out and leave now?"

Phyllis filled her bags with their money

And went down the highway, a victim

Of inherited kindliness, troubled

By remembrances of recent events....