This bilingual edition leaps effortlessly between the natural world and meditations on culture, family, language, and longing. Hernández’s work moves the reader beyond the realm of the individual poet toward a deeper human understanding: “I cried until I was water / until I was sea / and I began to swim / toward the depths.” A recent Venezuelan immigrant to America, Hernández bridges the gulf between her two countries as she laments, “What I thought lost / is in the light of this dawn / I’m not alone / emptiness is only emptiness / the sea speaks to me.” Hernández’s self-possessed poetic voice reflects her decades of engagement with poetry, across languages and continents, pointing out that, “if not understanding each other is the constant / why should not speaking the same language / have to be a disaster?” Brilliantly rendered from the Spanish by esteemed translator Rowena Hill, The Farewell Light is a debut not to be missed.

Contents:           

Introduction / Askold Melnyczuk -- I. Únicamente mar = Only sea -- La medida que perdimos = The measure we lost -- Demora = Delay -- Nuestra canción = Our song -- La lluvia y el viaje = The rain and the journey -- Un punto ciego = A blind spot -- Mi tía Roque = My Aunt Roque -- Refugiada = A refugee -- Río Turbio = Río Turbio -- El amor familiar = Family love -- Loba, mi perra = Loba, my dog -- María Fernanda = María Fernanda -- Hogar = Home -- Algo que saber = Something to know -- El incendio en la montaña = The fire on the mountain -- Chrysanthemums, 17 de Diciembre = Chrysanthemums, 17th December -- Hermanas = Sisters -- Todo se escapa = Everything escapes -- Nanda = Nanda -- II. Helada = Freeze -- El silencio persiste = Silence persists -- Secreto = Secret -- Desde la luna = From the moon -- El mar y la nada = The sea and emptiness -- Llovizna = Drizzle -- Acero y gravedad = Steel and gravity -- El manuscrito de la lluvia = The manuscript of the rain -- El paisaje del tiempo = Time’s landscape -- El Cielo Subsiguiente = The following sky -- Mare Imbrium = Mare Imbrium -- La nada = Nothingness -- Un caballo = A horse -- III. I love confusion = I love confusion -- La cueva de una misma lengua = The cave of one same tongue -- Traducción = Translation -- El mismo idioma = The same language -- Una rosa azul = Blue rose -- La pregunta en otro idioma = The question in a different language -- Walt Whitman = Walt Whitman -- Edith Sitwell = Edith Sitwell -- Jorge Eielson = Jorge Eielson -- IV. Venus, Júpiter y la Luna, Febrero, 2023 = Venus, Jupiter and the moon, February, 2023 -- Aprendizaje = Learning -- La Luna Paleolítica = The Paleolithic Moon -- Miopía = Myopia -- El Gato Argon = Argon the cat -- Árbol = Tree -- Miami Book Fair 2016 = Miami Book Fair 2016 -- Jamaica Pond = Jamaica Pond -- Tortugas Marinas = Sea turtles -- Patti Smith = Patti Smith -- El sentido del mundo = The meaning of the world -- Templanza = Fortitude.