Poeten, presten og revolusjonæren

I kveld var jeg på Litteraturhuset for å høre Ernesto Cardenal, en av de største nålevende latinamerikanske poeter, men også frigjøringsteolog, forhenværende kulturminister og revolusjonær. (grundigere biografi hos Wikipedia) Den kortvokste 83-åringen med skjegg og langt hvitt hår under svart alpelue hadde forsamlingen i sin hule hånd fra første øyeblikk, ubehjelpelig tolk til tross.

Poet, prest og revolusjonær - Cardenal gjorde det klinkende klart at det ikke var noen motsetning mellom disse; snarere at det var ulike sider av samme sak. Poeten formidler revolusjonen og prestegjerningen, presten bruker poesi i formidlingen av revolusjonen, og revolusjonen utfører evangeliets sosiale budskap på jord og formidler sitt budskap gjennom poesien.

Hmmm... sammenhengen virket så klar i hodet mitt, og så diffus i skrift. Jaja. For øvrig slutter jeg aldri å forundre eller irritere meg (alt etter humøret) over at de aller, aller fleste nordmennene som er interessert i Latin-Amerika befinner seg temmelig langt ute på den politiske venstresiden. På den annen side kan man knapt bli noe annet enn sosialist når man ser og opplever de ekstreme sosiale og økonomiske forskjellene i verdensdelen. Et absurd eksempel: Guatemala er det landet i verden med flest private helikoptere per innbygger. Og det er 13 millioner innbyggere i landet.

Den beste bolken var diktopplesningen. Først leste den norske poeten Inger Elisabeth Hansen den norske gjendiktningen og dernest leste Ernesto Cardenal originalen på spansk med sin utpregede mellomamerikanske/karibiske uttale. Får lyst til å skaffe meg Salmos og Canto cósmico. Men det beste diktet må være "Oración por Marilyn Monroe". Påfallende hvor tidsriktig det er. Bytt ut Marilyn Monroe med f.eks. Britney Spears, og det er fortsatt en sylskarp observasjon og beinhard samfunnskritikk. Den norske gjendiktningen fant jeg ikke på internett, så jeg gjengir den på engelsk, skamløst kopiert fra denne nettsiden:

PRAYER FOR MARILYN MONROE

Lord
receive this young woman known around the world as Marilyn Monroe
although that wasn't her real name
(but You know her real name, the name of the orphan raped at the age of 6
and the shopgirl who at 16 had tried to kill herself)
who now comes before You without any makeup
without her Press Agent
without photographers and without autograph hounds,
alone like an astronaut facing night in space.

She dreamed when she was little that she was naked in a church
(according to the Time account)
before a prostrated crowd of people, their heads on the floor
and she had to walk on tiptoe so as not to step on their heads.
You know our dreams better than the psychiatrists.
Church, home, cave, all represent the security of the womb
but something else too...
The heads are her fans, that's clear
(the mass of heads in the dark under the beam of light).
But the temple isn't the studios of 20th Century-Fox.
The temple—of marble and gold—is the temple of her body
in which the Son of Man stands whip in hand
driving out the studio bosses of 20th Century-Fox
who made Your house of prayer a den of thieves.

Lord
in this world polluted with sin and radioactivity
You won't blame it all on a shopgirl
who, like any other shopgirl, dreamed of being a star.
Her dream just became a reality (but like Technicolor's reality).
She only acted according to the script we gave her
—the story of our own lives. And it was an absurd script.
Forgive her, Lord, and forgive us
for our 20th Century
for this Colossal Super-Production on which we all have worked.
She hungered for love and we offered her tranquilizers.
For her despair, because we're not saints
Psychoanalysis was recommended to her.
Remember, Lord, her growing fear of the camera
and her hatred of makeup — insisting on fresh makeup for each scene —
and how the terror kept building up in her
and making her late to the studios.

Like any other shopgirl
she dreamed of being a star.
And her life was unreal like a dream that a psychiatrist interprets and files.
Her romances were a kiss with closed eyes
and when she opened them
she realized she had been under floodlights
as they killed the floodlights!
and they took down the two walls of the room (it was a movie set)
while the Director left with his scriptbook
because the scene had been shot.
Or like a cruise on a yacht, a kiss in Singapore, a dance in Rio
the reception at the mansion of the Duke and Duchess of Windsor
all viewed in a poor apartment's tiny living room.

The film ended without the final kiss.
She was found dead in her bed with her hand on the phone.
And the detectives never learned who she was going to call.
She was
like someone who had dialed the number of the only friendly voice
and only heard the voice of a recording that says: WRONG NUMBER.
Or like someone who had been wounded by gangsters
reaching for a disconnected phone.

Lord
whoever it might have been that she was going to call
and didn't call (and maybe it was no one
or Someone whose number isn't in the Los Angeles phonebook)
You answer that telephone!
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OPPDATERT: Oppdaget akkurat en artikkel om Ernesto Cardenal i den spanske avisen El Mundo.
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