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***This is the forty-second
in a never-ending series called BACKSTORY OF THE POEM where the Chris
Rice Cooper Blog (CRC) focuses on one specific poem and how the poet wrote
that specific poem. All BACKSTORY OF THE POEM links are at the end
of this piece.
#42 Backstory of the Poem
Mountain
by Haroldo Barbosa Filho
Can you go through the step-by-step process of writing
this poem from the moment the idea was first conceived in your brain until
final form?
My creative process is sometimes
tempestuous: the sentences appear in swirls. Other times, ideas come quietly,
as if emerging from a placid lake. Everything depends on the moment, on what is
happening inside me and what I see and feel of an external event. I do not care
so much about styles, but writing sincerities. ( Above Left: Haroldo Barbosa Filho in 2018. Copyright permission granted by Haroldo Barbosa Filho for this CRC Blog Post Only
Below: Attributed and copyright permission granted by Haroldo Barbosa Filho for this CRC Blog Post Only)
Where were you when you started to actually write the
poem? And please describe the place in
great detail. When starting this poem, I was alone in my home in the city of São Paulo,
Brazil, with a white sheet of a text editor program and mentally reproducing an
image of Maine I had seen in my "computer travels": Cadillac Mountain
in Bar Harbor.
For some time, I have a great passion for that state, especially
the Portland of Longfellow, the Rockport of the Brazilian lyric singer Bidu
Sayão and the Bangor of Stephen King. I tried to remember the details of that
landscape. I imagined myself sitting on one of the stones, breathing the air of
the United States. Suddenly I noticed that my soul was there, but the body was
stuck to my reality. So I felt small, sad, because I wanted to live in that
place. Thus, these lines have taken shape.
What month and year did you start writing this poem? This poem
was written at the end of 2015.
How many drafts of this poem did you write before
going to the final? (And can you share a photograph of your rough drafts with
pen markings on it?)
I typed the poem directly into the
computer using text software. After the first sketch, I remember changing one
word or another. The poem was published practically as it was initially
conceived.
Were there any lines in any of your rough drafts of
this poem that were not in the final version?
And can you share them with us? In fact, I
felt a very great distress to finish the poem. This caused me to continue
transferring my feelings to the computer, so that another poem appeared, where
I tried to put myself in my place as a small poet in search of expansion, at
that moment, not knowing how to do it.
I looked through the gap and realized How big was
the
Universe out there.
And how small was
the gap on the inside here.
I looked through the gap and
realized
that I was the loneliness.
If it were not for it, maybe it could be
the gap. Or, who knows, the Universe
What do you want readers of this poem to take from
this poem? I think this poem shows the reader that everyone has dreams. And that it
is the right of each to express these dreams, trying to realize them, however
difficult the difficulties may be.
Which part of the poem was the most emotional of you
to write and why? Was the part where I cite forgiveness. I reflected a lot on how hard it
is to forgive and, especially, to forgive myself.
Has this poem been published before? And if so where? This poem,
like the other one quoted, is part of the book "Brief Words"
published by Amazon (bilingual: English and Portuguese).
Anything you would like to add? I want to
thank you, Christal, for the kind invitation to join your blog. I am sure that
from it many people will know a little more of my literature and will share my
dreams. (Right: Haroldo Barbosa Filho in 2010. Copyright permission granted by Haroldo Barbosa Filho for this CRC Blog Post Only)
Mountain
There is a time when,
faced with so many losses,
you see
yourself with nothing of what in the worldly
life, claims to be something.
It
is as if, naked as a monk,
finding loneliness,
With a gourd to drink the
tsampa
And a small piece of ground that does not belong to him, Where he dares
to sleep.
And looking at the shallows of the mountain,
Compares it with its own
size
And acknowledges that the monument
is the mountain, not you.
You climb the
mountain
And glimpse an infinite ahead and high,
A vastness that proves to be
much more than you
And of which its importance is minimal.
At this moment, the
nape of the neck is numb
And you plow within yourself.
Stop hating, stop
complaining,
Only then comes that sensation that emanates from
the inside
out,
It wants to forgive
It wants forgiveness.
Only then you become part of the
mountain,
The landscape in front,
of the mantle full of eons that cover
it.
Come to truly love.
I
was born in Jardinopolis, a small town in the Alta Mogiana
region, located in
the state of São Paulo, Brazil.
Nowadays I works as an adman writer and
journalist. As an author, I has published books in many literary areas, such as
sociology, romance, and poetry collections. In English I published “Brief
Words” (poems) and “Stories for us to read while we grow up” (a book for K-12
children).
I'm 57 years old. (Left: Haroldo Barbosa Filho in 2010. Copyright permission granted by Haroldo Barbosa Filho for this CRC Blog Post Only)
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BACKSTORY OF THE POEM
LINKS
001 December 29, 2017
Margo
Berdeshevksy’s “12-24”
002 January 08, 2018
Alexis
Rhone Fancher’s “82 Miles From the Beach, We Order The Lobster At Clear Lake
Café”
003 January 12, 2018
Barbara
Crooker’s “Orange”
004 January 22, 2018
Sonia
Saikaley’s “Modern Matsushima”
005 January 29, 2018
Ellen
Foos’s “Side Yard”
006 February 03, 2018
Susan
Sundwall’s “The Ringmaster”
007 February 09, 2018
Leslea
Newman’s “That Night”
008 February 17, 2018
Alexis
Rhone Fancher “June Fairchild Isn’t Dead”
009 February 24, 2018
Charles
Clifford Brooks III “The Gift of the Year With Granny”
010 March 03, 2018
Scott
Thomas Outlar’s “The Natural Reflection of Your Palms”
011 March 10, 2018
Anya
Francesca Jenkins’s “After Diane Beatty’s Photograph “History Abandoned”
012 March 17, 2018
Angela
Narciso Torres’s “What I Learned This Week”
013 March 24, 2018
Jan
Steckel’s “Holiday On ICE”
014 March 31, 2018
Ibrahim
Honjo’s “Colors”
015 April 14, 2018
Marilyn
Kallett’s “Ode to Disappointment”
016 April 27, 2018
Beth
Copeland’s “Reliquary”
017 May 12, 2018
Marlon
L Fick’s “The Swallows of Barcelona”
018 May 25, 2018
Juliet
Cook’s “ARTERIAL DISCOMBOBULATION”
019 June 09, 2018
Alexis
Rhone Fancher’s “Stiletto Killer. . . A Surmise”
020 June 16, 2018
Charles
Rammelkamp’s “At Last I Can Start Suffering”
021 July 05, 2018
Marla
Shaw O’Neill’s “Wind Chimes”
022 July 13, 2018
Julia Gordon-Bramer’s
“Studying Ariel”
023 July 20, 2018
Bill Yarrow’s “Jesus
Zombie”
024 July 27, 2018
Telaina Eriksen’s “Brag
2016”
025 August 01, 2018
Seth Berg’s “It is only
Yourself that Bends – so Wake up!”
026 August 07, 2018
David Herrle’s “Devil In
the Details”
027 August 13, 2018
Gloria Mindock’s “Carmen
Polo, Lady Necklaces, 2017”
028 August 21, 2018
Connie Post’s “Two
Deaths”
029 August 30, 2018
Mary Harwell Sayler’s
“Faces in a Crowd”
030 September 16, 2018
Larry Jaffe’s “The
Risking Point”
031 September 24,
2018
Mark Lee Webb’s “After
We Drove”
032 October 04, 2018
Melissa Studdard’s
“Astral”
033 October 13, 2018
Robert Craven’s “I Have
A Bass Guitar Called Vanessa”
034 October 17, 2018
David Sullivan’s “Paper Mache
Peaches of Heaven”
035 October 23, 2018
Timothy Gager’s
“Sobriety”
036 October 30, 2018
Gary Glauber’s “The
Second Breakfast”
037 November 04, 2018
Heather Forbes-McKeon’s
“Melania’s Deaf Tone Jacket”
038 November 11, 2018
Andrena Zawinski’s
“Women of the Fields”
039 November 00, 2018
Gordon Hilger’s “Poe”
040 November 16, 2018
Rita Quillen’s “My
Children Question Me About Poetry” and “Deathbed Dreams”
041 November 20, 2018
Jonathan Kevin Rice’s
“Dog Sitting”
http://chrisricecooper.blogspot.com/2018/11/41-backstory-of-poem-dog-sitting-by.html
042 November 22, 2018
Haroldo Barbosa Filho’s
“Mountain”
https://chrisricecooper.blogspot.com/2018/11/42-backstory-of-poem-mountain-by.html
https://chrisricecooper.blogspot.com/2018/11/42-backstory-of-poem-mountain-by.html
