In honor of Nicaraguan Independence Day, we present this work by one of the country’s most evocative poets.

 

A stunted oak without greenery
how dry yesterday seemed to everyone,
son of the moor and the drought,
next victim of the woodcutter,

who was like a girl without love
that in its sterility was consumed,
with the rain last night oh, what a joy!—
It has dawned this morning in bloom.

I have been a little surprised
when contemplating in the flowering oak
so much tenderness of spring,

who steals in the gardens of dawn,
those mother-of-pearl flowers with which it blooms
the dead arms of which nothing expects.