El hombre riega
sus jardines,
mira el cielo
y no está estrellado,
pero sí, silencioso,
cargado de humedad
y esperanza.
Al otro lado del mundo,
caen bombas, misiles,
drones, la metralla
despierta hasta los muertos.
Rolando Gabrielli2026
Suena,
suena,
el teléfono,
no siempre
estoy,
ni siquiera
para mí
mismo.
Rolando Gabrielli2026
It rings, it rings,
the telephone—
I’m not always there,
not even
for myself.
Las palabras,
no solo tienen
la vigencia,
respiración,
sino el tiempo,
la memoria,
libertad.
Rolando Gabrielli2026
Words
do not only have
vitality,
breath,
but also time,
memory,
freedom
Si crees que te he olvidado,
te equivocas y vuelves a equivocarte,
si piensas que me he olvidado
de la fecha.
Crees conocerme en cada uno
de los detalles, cada esquina
de mi ser, quizás, me gustaría
saberlo y que así fuera.
Rolando Gabrielli2026
A propósito de la
inmortalidad,
del cangrejo,
el hombre se
plantea superar al tiempo,
proyectarse al más
allá.
Ha intentado volar
en carnes vivas,
transitar de su
espacio vital,
alcanzar nuevas
marcas, alturas,
una obsesión
infinita buscar lo inalcanzable,
fantasear con el
frívolo artilugio de la inmortalidad.
Es un viejo juego
versus su destino,
el camino infinito
hacia el universo infinito,
al parecer,
lo que no se tiene ni alcanza a ver,
lo desconocido, es
lo más preciado,
dejar atrás la
caverna, aún permaneciendo
en ella
mentalmente.
Es tiempo de
repicar campanas
para ese sol del
brillante espacio
que muere
en el ocaso,
pero nos deslumbra
y convoca,
paso a paso, se
anuncia en su agonía,
va y viene en una
tierra desolada
de almas muertas,
cuerpos sepultados,
escondrijo de un
mundo deshumanizado.
Sus autores sacan
a bailar la muerte
en cualquier
esquina, a su paso
los humanos son
tratados como en un insectario.
Todo muere,
absolutamente,
de pies a cabeza
nada queda,
una apuesta
macabra de este siglo
imitar a la
muerte en todas sus dimensiones
y vivirla, que es
aún peor.
Hoy me entero, da
lo mismo el tiempo,
los viejos tanques
de la memoria
avanzan casi
con rigor romano,
precisos, aplastan,
van aplastando
todo lo que
obstaculiza su paso,
edificaciones,
gente, piedras sobre piedras,
felices avanzan
inmortales sobre la nada,
dejan un
desamparado paisaje,
pero la muerte les
acompaña.
A propósito de
inmortalidad,
el hombre se
plantea superar al tiempo,
de tantas maneras
se proyecta más allá
de su espacio
vital,
en el camino del
universo,
mientras la Tierra
se debate aquí,
en una anunciada
agonía,
que va y
viene con silencio esclavo
del hombre que se
niega a vivir en paz.
Si la muerte vive
sin esperanza de vida,
seguirá siendo
inmortal.
Rolando Gabrielli2026
¿Quién nos sacó esa foto, Gonzalo,
me pregunto más de medio siglo después,
un 10 de septiembre de 1973,
frente a La Moneda, en Santiago?
El azar tiene caminos inexplicables,
irrefutables, misteriosos.
Estaba por llegar, estallar,
la silenciosa primavera,
y horas después ardería en llamas
La Moneda, el Palacio de Gobierno
con el presidente sangrante entre sus muros.
Éramos tan jóvenes,
vivíamos alegres un presente incierto,
pero felices en el mejor de los mundos,
disfrutando cada palabra,
las calles grises de Santiago.
Un río de aguas turbias cruzaba
entonces nuestras vidas,
imperturbablemente.
Viene el lobo nos decíamos,
como el cuento,
Chile estaba asediado,
respirábamos incertidumbre,
un cielo denso, espeso, brumoso,
se había instalado en la memoria.
El día era una sorpresa inevitable,
que ya no dependía de nosotros.
Rolando Gabrielli2026
In Front of La Moneda
Toda la poesía,
la que he leído,
escrito,
y la que aún
no he escrito,
está relacionada
con la memoria
y si quedara
algún espacio,
para el presente,
volvería al
principio,
el Verbo.
Rolando Gabrielli2026
All poetry,
the one I have read,
the one I have written,
and the one
still unwritten,
belongs to memory.
And if there were
any space left
for the present,
I would return
to the beginning—
the Word.
El tiempo no se
detiene
dos veces en un mismo sitio
y las imágenes que vivieron su vida
juegan quizás con el pasado.
El desvencijado tobogán de la historia
pasa revista en alguna esquina
de la ciudad que
siempre desconozco.
No hay más poesía en las palabras
que las mismas
palabras usadas,
una y otra vez
malgastadas.
Nadie podría
decirme que no estuve aquí
en el lugar antes de nacer
o en ningún otro que pudiera superar
la fecha que no encuentro
la hora y el sitio
preciso
que estremece las páginas
de un autor desconocido.
Nada es más seguro a veces,
que la mano circular
sobre la piel de
un esclavo.
Es la tinta
milenaria de un cuerpo
la grasa y el sudor de un continente negro.
Es aquí donde el
pasado pareciera ignorarme
Sostengo que no hay peor cuña
que la de un mismo
palo
jalo de mi sombra que me persigue
sin ninguna razón
confiable
y bajo el telón.
La performance no
es mi estilo
de vida, ni de
muerte,
sin embargo, he logrado
sobrevivir
con unos cuantos
trucos.
Rolando Gabrielli2026
Buscaba la
palabra,
si no he hecho
otra cosa
en estos últimos
años,
que el tiempo
cruza historias
y me devuelve
siempre
al punto de
partida,
donde precisamente
no estás
y siento que
repito las mismas
palabras sin sentido.
Rolando Gabrielli2026
La fuerza de la poesía,
es la fuerza del amor.
Rolando Gabrielli2026
Poetry’s strength
is the strength of love.
La Diosa lee,
el silencio,
escucha.
Rolando Gabrielli2026
Un día
perfecto
¿La vida está en
otra parte?,
pareciera una
pregunta de ciencia ficción,
una ruta al más
allá del planeta ausente,
mientras aquí y
ahora, el plomo cae
sin gloria ni
piedad, dolorosamente
mortal,
inequívoca, rotundamente,
al ulular de
sirenas con sus alarmas
dementes, propias
del manicomio
que viene del
espacio y por todas partes,
luces ciegas,
luces de muerte
y la poesía no
puede hacer milagros
en un mundo
cruel que patrocina
en sus
grandes cadenas el espanto.
¿Alguien debiera
detener a la muerte?
La oscura mano del
mal aprieta dientes
y gatilla fuego,
barre lo que no logra ver
en la arena de la
nada.
¿Es el peso de la
eternidad,
el que vuela con
alas jóvenes
y vuelve al amanecer?
Rolando Gabrielli2026
A Perfect Day
Is life somewhere else?
Should someone stop death?
and returns at dawn?
Mi espejo
Mi blog
Mi hermano
Mis palabras
Mis sueños
Mi pasión
Mi fe
Mis días
simples
verlos correr
como si nada.
Rolando Gabrielli2026
My mirror
My blog
My brother
My words
My dreams
My passion
My faith
My days
simple—
to watch them run
as if nothing.
https://letralia.com/ciudad-letralia/fechado-en-panama/2026/03/05/poesia-parentesis-silencio/
Memory is the birthplace of the word. It travels, transforms itself, creates atmospheres, and bears witness to what it sees—what it selects, connects, and ultimately lives. Poetry breathes, and in that breath it founds something enduring.
From where I stand, Chileans have been extraordinarily fortunate. Few countries have known such a wealth of poets—voices we have been able to read, hear, and encounter—throughout the twentieth century and now into the first quarter of the twenty-first. A century that refuses to collapse even as chaos, stupidity, and the perverse digitalization of everyday life threaten to flatten human experience.
Not everything has been lost in our fragile paradise, the only one we have. Poetry is not merely part of the landscape; it changes the landscape of the arts themselves. A work either contains poetry or it does not. The distinction is absolute. Within the human spirit, the poem either takes root—or disappears.
Do not search for it, reader, in empty corners where words never arrive and nothing ever blossoms.
I remain drawn to the overlooked: the talented losers, the silent guests, those forgotten despite their merits, those postponed and only reluctantly accepted. I think of the disappeared—how terrible forgetfulness is. And of those who never stopped writing. And of those who, regardless of years, distances, or eras, I sense are still present.
Once again we find ourselves walking toward the abyss, ignoring the words that defend life.
Poetry, however, remains a light in the tunnel of history.
A poem is more than words in their pure state. It carries the imprint of the person who writes it, the circumstances of its birth, the readers it seeks—or unexpectedly finds—and the strange durability that allows it to endure in time.
A poem survives when its language remains clear, fluid, and alive, when its message resists the distortions of fleeting interpretations or opportunistic readings.
As I write these lines, I am not consulting books or archives. Instead I turn to my own inner oracle, pressing memory and lived experience for what they still contain. Inevitably there will be arbitrariness, unconscious bias, personal taste. But poetry is not an exercise in taxonomy. We are not arranging specimens in a cabinet of curiosities.
Nor can we know everything or square the circle.
Poetry remains an enigma—even when it appears transparent, objective, or realistic, as though it were merely tracing the contours of human nature or landscape.
Every poet inhabits a different dimension: a particular depth, a particular historical moment, a particular resonance with readers. Ultimately, each possesses a singularity that cannot be replicated.
I remember an observation made years ago by the Chilean critic Jaime Concha during the era of the Quimantú publishing house. Concha compared poets to Chile’s geography.
And Chile is, indeed, a “mad geography,” as Benjamín Subercaseaux famously called it.
From childhood I have felt the force of that landscape. Santiago itself—dry, austere—lies beneath an enormous snow-capped mountain. A dark river crosses the city without ceremony, while the valley around it fills with restless lives resisting routine and imagining new futures.
“Santiago—capital of what?” the poet Gonzalo Rojas once asked.
He had every right to ask. Born in Chillán, widely read, widely traveled, Rojas belonged to that rare category of poets who resist classification altogether.
There are many such figures. Poets from the provinces—especially the south—though never provincial in spirit. Poets from the north, from the frontier where Chile begins after Peru and Bolivia. Urban poets from the capital. Wanderers, expatriates, exiles.
In the end, poetry is inseparable from reading.
For proof, one need only think of Borges.
Concha’s metaphor extended further. The poets of Chile, he suggested, resemble the features of the Andes themselves: towering summits, volcanoes, lakes, coves, rivers, even delicate threads of crystalline water.
Chilean poetry has always been tied to the land.
Gabriela Mistral. Pablo Neruda. Pablo de Rokha. Nicanor Parra. Efraín Barquero. Jorge Teillier. Juvencio Valle. Violeta Parra. Rolando Cárdenas. Alfonso Alcalde. Floridor Pérez. Raúl Zurita. And surely others I fail to mention.
In many of them there is a powerful telluric force—a poetry rooted in earth, weather, and distance.
Yet Chile’s poetic tradition stretches even further back. Its founding poet is the Spanish soldier Alonso de Ercilla y Zúñiga, author of La Araucana, the epic that first named the country in verse. In its opening lines he describes a land both distant and formidable, a place of proud and warlike people who had never bowed to a foreign king.
With that gesture, Chile entered literature.
The country that Ercilla measured—from north to south, in its astonishing length—became a geography not only of mountains and rivers, but of language.
Nicanor Parra, who delighted in paradox, once offered a warning that remains unforgettable:
Woe to those who read only one book.
Some readers may feel that looking backward risks nostalgia. Yet memory in poetry is not regression—it is a form of knowledge. It sharpens the present and helps us imagine the future.
What makes Chilean poetry so compelling is its extraordinary diversity. Before and after the political rupture of 1973—what many remember as a cultural blackout—the tradition persisted with surprising vitality.
The coup scattered artists across the world. A diaspora emerged whose significance has yet to be fully recognized in Chile’s cultural history. Yet through exile, displacement, and silence, the word survived.
The fracture extended beyond poetry. Cinema, painting, fiction, journalism, philosophy, theater, music—every branch of culture was splintered. What once seemed a unified artistic landscape broke into fragments dispersed across continents.
The rupture was total. Horizontal. Vertical.
The spine of a culture snapped.
Those who lived through those years remember a silence that seemed almost physical: a blackout in broad daylight. The longest night in Chile’s history.
Reading poets is always a conversation across time. In recent years, those conversations have sometimes continued in my dreams.
Not long ago I dreamed of Gonzalo Millán, one of the most original voices of his generation. In the dream he left me a note—warm, generous, though written in unfamiliar handwriting—speaking about life and love. He had overheard me mention a woman and suggested I visit him. A typewriter, he said, was waiting for me.
In another dream the poet Waldo Rojas appeared like a character from Proust, patiently immersed in the craft of language. I have also dreamed of Enrique Lihn, of Parra, of Teillier, even of Neruda—whom I never met. Rolando Cárdenas appeared once in the distant landscapes of Chiloé, and Antonio Skármeta, who was once my teacher.
Such dreams are consoling. They remind me that poets do not entirely disappear.
They remain present in the pages we return to, in the conversations we continue with them long after they are gone.
I count it among the privileges of my life to have known many of these writers in person—to share with them workshops, classrooms, conversations, and the early atmospheres of literary discovery.
Those years now feel irretrievable: an unforgettable Chile.
More than half a century has passed. We are distant now not only in time but also in experience. In a sense, we ourselves have become part of memory.
And yet poetry endures.
Sooner or later, it calls us back.
Have you ever seen
anything more disgraceful
than the world today?
