I'M SPEAKING

"Gazes face-to-face,/ like twin mirrors reflecting only each other./ In front of the eyes, an opaque film/ behind which every lover conceals his egoism." Guillen has been writing poetry in the Andalusian tradition from his native Granada for decades, but this marks the first major translation of his work into English. Guillen's poetry is oriented through sensuality of the both the body and the word, invoking a kind of dramatic faith in existence to explore themes of isolation within temporality, loss and the boundaries of physical consciousness. Yet Guillen retains an exuberant tone which, despite occasionally straying into melodramatic territory, allows him to pull off such unfashionable (in America) maneuvers as personifying an instant: "Certitude comes as a bedazzlement, instants of light./ Or of blackness." In a useful introductory interview, Guillen describes Andalusian poetry as characterized by "a predominance of feeling over pure rationality," a quality evident in his continuous lyrical examination of death as a figurative condition: "We have to love the dead, to understand them/ They're like good children in a fit of sulking./ They've lost their toys." Poet McKinney's able, stripped-down translations (with facing-page Spanish) channels the intensity of Guillen's emotional pitch with largely genial, meditative results, although a hamstrung line at times will stumble: "out of imagination mystery is born." Guillen was awarded Spain's National Prize for Literature in 1994, and this reasonably sized sampler of his work should serve as a full-bodied introduction to an American audience. (Sept.)