After Love, Onion Lullabies, Less Your Belly or For Freedom, with these phrases and titles, Miguel Hernández became one of the most notable Latin American poets of the 20th century. He had little time, he died in Franco’s prison at the age of 31, eight decades ago.
March 28 marks the 80th anniversary of his death after contracting bronchitis, typhus and tuberculosis because of his left-wing ideology. He said in prison in Palencia (1940) that he could not cry because his tears were frozen with cold.
The Ministry of Culture and Sports, raised to the altar of the great figures of Spanish literature, has launched the initiative to convene the I Chained Poem “80 Verses for Miguel Hernández”, which will take place next Monday via Twitter, Facebook and Twitter Accounts Instagram of the General Directorate for Books and Reading Promotion.
The verses of this poem are tagged with the hashtag #80versosparaMiguelHernandez. Three verses by the extraordinary author are published as a header and from these lines each social network user can send their own, which will be added to an 80-verse chain poem.
The final result will be disseminated over the following days via the Directorate-General for Books and Reading Promotion’s social networks, as a complementary part of the commemoration of the important poet and playwright among readers and students.
His wife and mother of his son, Josefina Manresa, wrote him a letter in the first moments of seclusion, telling him that they only had bread and onions. The response from Miguel Hernández was with poetry, nana of the onions:
Onion is Frost
closed and poor
frost of your days
and my nights
Hunger and Onion:
black ice and frost
big and round.
Joan Manuel Serrat recorded a disc entitled Miguel Hernández and featured sung versions of poems such as For Freedom, Less your bebel, He came with three wounds and of course Nana de las onions.
For freedom I bleed, I fight, I live.
For freedom, my eyes and my hands
like a carnal tree, generous and captive,
I give surgeons.
jcm/ft