Sorrow

by Claribel Alegría

In Sorrow, Claribel Alegria plumbs the depths of grief and wrests hope from pain and memory in lyrics written as love letters to her deceased husband. The poems not only summon their shared past in vivid detail, but also ponder the meaning of death and separation, and the yearning for eventual reunion.

Genres: Poetry, Spanish Literature

104 pages, Paperback

First published October 1, 1999

About the author

Clara Isabel Alegría Vides was a Nicaraguan poet, essayist, novelist, and journalist who is a major voice in the literature of contemporary Central America. She writes under the pseudonym Claribel Alegría. She was awarded the 2006 Neustadt International Prize for Literature.

(from Wikipedia)

Reviews

[Anika · Rating 5 out of 5]

I went out searching for you
crossing valleys
and mountains
ploughing distant seas
asking of the clouds
and the wind your whereabouts
it was useless
useless
you were within me.


This collection was written as Claribel Alegria went on a month-long trip through Asia that she'd planned with her husband, who had died before they were able to go. I bawled my way through this slim collection.
It was beautiful and heart-warming/wrenching.

[Jennifer · Rating 5 out of 5]

This collection of poetry primarily deals with the poet's feelings of loss after the death of her husband. Beautiful in both the Spanish and English that it is printed in.

[Victoria de Vall · Rating 5 out of 5]

It's rare that I find poetry or even writing in general that I feel I can truly relate to the depth of love - especially romantic love - that they experience. this book of poems was short but moving, touched my heart and soul and inspired me, and made me feel a sense of kindredness, that other true lovers, other deeply loving women, have existed and have loved.

I also particularly value reading translations of books originally published in non-english languages, outside of the USA (especially the work of other Latinas, and especially when originally written in Spanish!).

[Elena · Rating 5 out of 5]

voy a comprarme este libro, es perfecto

[Andrea · Rating 1 out of 5]

I gave it one star for the one poem I liked... “Your absence is my companion”

[Laura · Rating 5 out of 5]

Wow. I loved it so much! I found myself getting goosebumps while reading some of this queen‘a poetry.

[María Salamanca · Rating 5 out of 5]

the girls that get it, get it

[Dree · Rating 4 out of 5]

The poems in this short collection were written after the death of Alegría's husband. Many of the poems are quite short, but they focus on grief, loneliness, loss, life alone as an older woman who knows she will join her husband relatively soon.

This is a bilingual edition, and it was fascinating to compare the Spanish and English versions. I do not know enough Spanish to read the Spanish edition, but I do know enough to see the changes in word order and obviously the splitting/joining of lines. This is what fascinates me about translated poetry--how much does the form matter? The cadence and syllables? Thes epoems are, I think, all about the meaning and not the form/cadence.

[Ery Caswell · Rating 4 out of 5]

saudade

one of my favorite words I've ever encountered in any language. notoriously difficult to translate. so naturally I had to read this title.

these poems trace a loss that cannot be lost--to the perimeters of life where death waits but is not found--but is. greeted & said goodbye to. I love to have the original Spanish next to the English in this translation by Forché.

I think these words embody the spirit of the whole book most to me

"I free myself of you / and yet go with you" (p. 83)

[Fátima Onsang · Rating 5 out of 5]

"Sin embargo es ahora; sólo ahora; después de tu partida; sin retorno; que sé que ya eres mío; para siempre."

[Karla Carrillo · Rating 5 out of 5]

Simplemente
Saudade

[Marbenele · Rating 4 out of 5]

Ay

[♡ · Rating 5 out of 5]

now I need to read everything else she has written.

[Alina · Rating 4 out of 5]

Masterfully captures the grief and sorrow of losing a partner.

I would like to read one of her works which he had translated as well.

[Lorraine · Rating 3 out of 5]

This collection of poems was written after the loss of the poet's husband; they attempt to make sense of her grief and her despair that we cannot know if a reunion after death is possible (the poems lean on the side of no).

[Robert Beveridge · Rating 2 out of 5]

Claribel Alegria, Sorrow (Curbstone Press, 1999)

Sorrow, a book of poems lamenting the death of Alegria's husband, is the kind of thing that, in a perfect world, would be immune to criticism. But, as Wilde so forthrightly put it, “all bad poetry is sincere.” This is no exception. The poems in this collection are barely poems at all, but more often are simply thoughts chopped up into lines to make them appear poetic. “Show, don't tell” has left the building for this one, folks.

“I don't want eternity
it overwhelms me
I want to be alive
while I live
without thinking
about why
I live...”
(“I Don't Want Eternity”)

There are a few pieces here where Alegria still seems to grasp the essence of poetry (and translator Carolyn Forche seizes on two of them in her introduction, the best part of the book), but they are in the minority here. This one didn't work for me at all. **

[Sunni · Rating 4 out of 5]

Alegria deals with the death of her husband through moving poems about life and relationships. It felt personal without making the reader feel like an outsider.

[Daniel Morgan · Rating 5 out of 5]

The title fits - the short poems in this book capture sorrow like nothing else I have ever read.

[Ulysses Montoya · Rating 5 out of 5]

Un poemario que tocas las arterias más sinceras del amor.