“What are the sounds that define you?” Rossy Toledo asked a group of Spanish students. For her, it was the “pregoneros”, the shouting vendors that used to wake her during morning markets. On Thursday, Oct. 24, Toledo shared four poems from her published collection, “Pregoneros despertar de voces.”
As she read her poems, she encouraged the class to write down everything that stood out to them. This included unfamiliar words, phrases that resonated with them, things that brought back memories and things they liked.
In the first poem, Toledo described the sensations of the bustling market and the shift in her emotions from irritation at being awoken, to a desire to buy “aguacates,” avocados, for fresh guacamole, then to the gradual “vuelva a calma” or “return to calmness” as the market reached its end.
In the second poem, she reflected on the tradition of street vendors, noting that “la fecha no importa:” the date doesn’t matter. Whether it was hundreds of years ago or yesterday, people have always created things and created a livelihood around that. By doing so, Toledo wrote, they are offering their lives in “probaditas,” or “little bites,” to their customers.
The third poem talked about “los piratas,” vendors that sell pirated movies, music, Louis Vuitton purses and more.
In the final poem, Toledo shared the story of someone in search of a loved one lost in the hubbub of the market. The lines “¿Eres tú?—Is it you?” and “No eres tú—It’s not you” repeat as the speaker encounters different strangers. The speaker loses their desire to find their unnamed companion as they realize the complexity of each person’s life in attendance at the market.
Toledo’s poetry was bursting with senses. Smells, sights, sounds and feelings captured the reader in every line, placing them directly among the “pregoneros.” As she read aloud, she provided translations as students needed them.
Toledo also encouraged students to write poems of their own, especially in Spanish. “Come up with words, too,” she said, referring to the use of “Spanglish,” the informal combination of Spanish and English. “You can do that.”
She provided a prompt, which said “si yo fuera una fruta, sería…porque…y…:” “if I was a fruit, I would be…because…and…,” as well as several other variations of the prompt. The class worked in small groups to write their poems. Toledo visited with each group and listened to the students read their work. She encouraged students to draw creativity from the world around them. “The campus of UI is beautiful,” she said. “You have so much poetry.”
Megan Kingsley can be reached at [email protected]