Cesaria

Follow up on 1201's comment:

While I'm only an occasional fan of rhyme, you do it well in your short poems in large part, pellegrino, I think because you make effective word choices that have a musical quality to them, and in this, as I noted in my original comment, the musical words support the narrative about the singer whom you're praising, so it's twice as effective.

The risk (I've made this mistake myself more than once) is to become so focussed on the sound of a word to match another rhyme that it confuses or disrupts the narrative. I couldn't make a connection between "aurora," a lovely sounding word, and the singer. Now, it could be argued that it is a "dawning" of a new kind of singing never before heard, but in that case I would suggest a line or two more to trigger the reader's imagination.

So many languages to your verse's voice

I choose not to translate at all, that is my choice

Letting my imagination fill in the blanks

Thanks!

cinco la estrella

I always thought it was *bizarre* how there isn't a direct word for saudade in English. I really like the first four lines and think you've come close to a definition. The last two change the focus of the poem, which makes for a nice dedicatory, but a less generic poem, I think (it's about a person, not an emotion — that's what I mean).

I do not understand the use of "aurora" beside Cabo Verde, did you perhaps mean "auroral", that is, "Cape Green that has the semblance of dawn"?

Since I'm already reviewing the Portuguese, let me also point out that "Triste rouxinol DE saudade" means "sad rouxinol made of saudade" / or "that comes from saudade". The first option is quite poetic, but you probably meant that Cesária Évora is a rouxinol, right? In that case, it should be: "triste rouxinol DA saudade".

Thanks for sharing, enjoyed this one.

'saudade', a Portuguese concept not easily transposed, let alone translated, well I guess you did.

justify aurora - goddess of dawn?

I liked this, pelegrino, although I had to work hard with Google to appreciate it. If it was a longer, I'm not sure I would have gone to the trouble.

Rhyme worked well here as did the meter, both of which gave a musical quality to the poem, quite appropriate, of course, given the narrative.