Fernando Pessoa & Co: Selected Poems

Fernando Pessoa

Grove Press, 1998 - Poetry - 290 pages

"One of the great originals of modern European poetry and Portugal's premier modernist."--Washington Post

"Pessoa has had many English-language interpreters but none better than Richard Zenith."--New York Review of Books

Fernando Pessoa--a poet who lived most of his life in Lisbon, Portugal, and who died in obscurity there-- is now recognized as one of the greatest writers of the twentieth century. In a newly updated and expanded edition of his celebrated 1998 Fernando Pessoa & Co., which Booklist hailed as "a beautiful one-volume course in the soul of the twentieth century," translator and biographer Richard Zenith brings together Pessoa's most memorable poetic works. Present here is poetry by Pessoa's famous trio of alter egos--Alberto Caeiro, Ricardo Reis, and Álvaro de Campos--as well as a varied selection of poems signed by Pessoa's own name. From spare minimalism to revolutionary exuberance, Fernando Pessoa & Co. showcases the seminal poet's timeless and innovative work in all of its extraordinary depth and poetic passion.

"Like Beckett, Pessoa is extremely funny. . . . His work is loaded with delights."--Guardian

"Pessoa would be Shakespeare if all that we had of Shakespeare were the soliloquies of Hamlet, Falstaff, Othello and Lear and the sonnets. His legacy is a set of explorations, in poetic form, of what it means to inhabit a human consciousness."--Los Angeles Times Book Review

Contents

• The Drama and Dream of Fernando Pessoa: 1
• The Unwitting Master: 37
• from THE KEEPER OF SHEEP: 43
• Ive never kept sheep: 45
• My gaze is clear like a sunflower: 48
• To not think of anything is metaphysics enough: 49
• Im a keeper of sheep: 52
• Hello keeper of sheep: 53
• Id rather be the dust of the road: 54
• The Tagus is more beautiful than the river that flows through my village: 55
• My gaze blue like the sky: 56
• What we see of things are the things: 57
• Yesterday afternoon a man from the cities: 58
• Like a large blot of smudged fire: 60
• Blessed be the same sun of other lands: 61
• The mystery of thingswhere is it?: 62
• I see a butterfly go by: 63
• The coach came down the road and went on: 64
• On an incredibly clear day: 65
• from THE SHEPHERD IN LOVE: 67
• Before I had you: 69
• Perhaps those who are good at seeing are poor at feeling: 70
• The shepherd in love lost his staff: 71
• from UNCOLLECTED POEMS: 73
• To see the fields and the river: 75
• When Spring returns: 76
• If I die young: 77
• It is night Its very dark In a house far away: 79
• On this whitely cloudy day I get so sad it almost scares me: 80
• The child who thinks about fairies and believes in them: 82
• Slowly the field unrolls and shines golden: 83
• Yesterday the preacher of truths his truths: 84
• They spoke to me of people and of humanity: 85
• I lie down in the grass: 86
• Dirty unknown child playing outside my door: 87
• You who are a mystic see a meaning in all things: 88
• Ah They want a light thats better than then suns: 89
• This morning I went out very early: 90
• I can also make conjectures: 91
• This may be the last day of my life: 92
• The Sad Epicurean: 93
• from ODES: 99
• Others narrate with lyres or harps: 101
• The gods grant nothing more than life: 102
• Dont clap your hands before beauty: 103
• Ah you believers in Christs and Marys: 104
• On this day when the green fields: 106
• Here with no other Apollo than Apollo: 107
• Above the truth reign the gods: 108
• Let the gods: 109
• Lips red from wine: 111
• I prefer roses my love to the homeland: 112
• Follow your destiny: 113
• I was never one who in love or in friendship: 114
• O morning that breaks without looking at me: 115
• Obey the law whether its wrong or you are: 116
• I want my verses to be like jewels: 117
• Day after day lifes the same life: 118
• Who delights in the mind can delight in no destiny: 119
• As if each kiss: 120
• Your dead gods tell me nothing I need: 121
• Fate frightens me Lydia Nothing is certain: 122
• I devote my higher mind to the ardent: 123
• My eyes see the fields the fields: 124
• Each man is a world and as each fountain: 125
• Not only wine but its oblivion I pour: 126
• How great a sadness and bitterness: 127
• Solemnly over the fertile land: 128
• As long as I feel the full breeze in my hair: 129
• The one I loved is not here you say: 130
• What we feel not what is felt: 131
• I dont know if the love you give is love you have: 132
• youll have everything: 133
• I was left in the world all alone: 134
• I tell with severity I think what I feel: 135
• I placidly wait for what I dont know: 136
• Countless lives inhabit us: 137
• The jaded Sensationist: 139
• I study myself but cant perceive: 143
• Listen Daisy What I did although: 144
• Ah the first minutes in cafes of new cities: 145
• Times Passage: 146
• It was on one of my voyages: 169
• Ah when we set out to sea: 170
• But its not just the cadaver: 171
• I leaned back in the deck chair and closed my eyes: 172
• The Tobacco Shop: 173
• OportoStyle Tripe: 180
• A Note in the Margin: 181
• Deferral: 183
• Sometimes I meditate: 185
• Ah the freshness in the face of leaving a task undone: 186
• At long last no doubt about it: 187
• Pop: 188
• I walk in the night of the suburban street: 189
• Yes I know its all quite natural: 191
• Streetcar Stop: 193
• Birthday: 194
• No All I want is freedom: 196
• Id like to be able to like liking: 197
• Reality: 198
• Im beginning to know myself I dont exist: 200
• Pack your bags for Nowhere at All: 201
• I got off the train: 202
• Impassively: 205
• On the eve of never departing: 206
• Symbols? Im sick of symbols: 207
• The ancients invoked the Muses: 208
• I dont know if the stars rule the world: 209
• Ive been thinking about nothing at all: 210
• All love letters are: 211
• The Mask Behind the Man: 213
• from SONGBOOK: 219
• Ocean Morning: 221
• God: 222
• From Slanting Rain: 223
• The wind is blowing too hard: 225
• The Mummy: 226
• The gods are happy: 231
• In the lightfooted marched of heavy time: 232
• Christmas: 233
• By the moonlight in the distance: 234
• Waterfront: 235
• Some Music: 236
• I feel sorry for the stars: 237
• I seem to be growing calm: 238
• Sleep: 239
• I contemplate the silent pond: 240
• Like a uselessly full glass: 241
• The sun shining over the field: 242
• I dont know how many souls I have: 243
• The soul with boundaries: 244
• Im sorry I dont respond: 246
• Autopsychography: 247
• I dont know how to be truly sad: 248
• The clouds are dark: 249
• Like an astonishing remnant: 250
• If I think for more than a moment: 251
• From the mountain comes a song: 252
• This species of madness: 253
• The wind in the darkness howls: 254
• I have ideas and reasons: 255
• With a smile and without haste: 256
• Outside where the trees: 257
• I hear in the night across the street: 258
• Almost anonymous you smile: 259
• This: 260
• The day is quiet quiet is the wind: 261
• The sun rests unmoving: 262
• The washwoman beats the laundry: 263
• To travel To change countries: 264
• This great wavering between: 265
• I have in me like a haze: 266
• Dreams systems myths ideals: 267
• I divide what I know: 268
• The child that laughs in the street: 269
• from MESSAGE: 271
• Prince Henry the Navigator: 273
• The Stone Pillar: 274
• The Sea Monster: 275
• Epitaph of Bartolomeu Dias: 276
• Ferdinand Magellan: 277
• Portuguese Sea: 278
• Prayer: 279
• Notes to the Introduction and the Poems: 281
• Bibliography: 288

Bibliographic information

• Title: Fernando Pessoa & Co: Selected Poems
• Author: Fernando Pessoa
• Editor: Richard Zenith
• Translated by: Richard Zenith
• Edition: reprint
• Publisher: Grove Press, 1998
• ISBN: 0802136273, 9780802136275
• Length: 290 pages
• Subjects: Poetry / Anthologies (multiple authors); Poetry / European / General; Poetry / General; Poetry / Subjects & Themes / General