Gastón Baquero was born in Cuba in 1918 and died in Madrid, Spain in 1997. He studied to be an agronomist, but early contact with José Lezama Lima and other poets of the literary group called Orígenes turned his interests toward poetry and journalism. He became a columnist for the Havana daily newspaper, Diario de la Marina, specializing in politics.
After the success of the Cuban revolution, the island became untenable for Baquero, and he stopped writing poetry until he was exiled to Spain in 1959. He supported himself by teaching journalism at the university level, and generously opened the door of his house to the many young Cubans who passed through Madrid.
In 1984, Baquero published his complete poems. In 1991, he brought out his last single collection, Poemas invisibles. His Poesía completa was published posthumously by Editorial Verbum in 1998. The editor of that volume, Pío E. Serrano, has written that Baquero "has become the most influential poet of new generations of poets in Cuba. Within him there was always the impassioned heartbeat of his island…"
Parque | Park |
---|---|
El parque de mi pueblo tiene |
The park in my village has |
The Angel of Rain: Selected Poems of Gastón Baquero, translated by Greg Simon & Steven F. White
“Parque,” ca. 1940; appears in the 1984 edition of Collected Poems manuscript courtesy Pío E. Serrano
Parque Martí (formerly parque Dominguez), probably in Baquero’s home town Banes. Photo courtesy Efraín Rodríguez Santana.
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