Dr. Javier Avila (pictured at left), associate professor of English, published his third book of poetry, Criatura del Olvido (translation: Creature of Oblivion), on November 6. The publisher is Terranova.
“The poems are a tribute to obsolescence, to things forgotten,” Avila says. “The destiny of everything is oblivion. The poems are fueled by absence, emptiness, time going by.” The future comes, Avila says, and all become unnecessary and replaceable.
One poem recalls the builders of ancient cathedrals, hard workers, now forgotten. In another, a child looks over a photo album with his grandfather and asks about a dead uncle. The poem, says Avila, reminds us that “we will also be the dead relative of some young stranger who will ask ‘who was that, Grandpa?’ ”
One poem, “To Die Like This,” portrays the death of Avila’s grandfather-in-law. “Death is not noble for most people,” Avila says. “It is hard to die with dignity. Most people become a reduction of what they used to be, dying in a hospital bed, next to a stranger.” Another poem shows Avila sorting through his father’s medicine cabinet a few weeks after his death.
The role of the poet is itself drifting into the past, as reading increasingly gets replaced by fascination with other media. Fittingly, the book’s cover pictures an old-fashioned, upside-down typewriter strewn with fallen leaves.
Nevertheless, the inevitability of oblivion doesn’t have to be a tragedy, Avila says. It is simply a fact. It is a fact that can inspire people to treasure and enjoy the present because it is brief. Finality reminds us not to neglect the people who need us now.
Neither is the Creature of Oblivion entirely sad. There are touches of subtle humor. The book is also a testament to the creativity engendered by loss. “What is lost becomes present in creation, on the page,” Avila says. “Those who are absent are given life through the magic of memory.”
Time, the guardian of memory, is the theme of all of Avila’s poetry. He became acutely aware of time when he underwent open heart surgery at the age of eight. The ordeal left him with a sense of urgency, of life happening now and the need to do what one values now, not put it off for some future time.
Avila is a versatile artist who has written poetry in Spanish and thriller novels in English. His second book of poetry, La Simetria del Tiempo, published in 2006, won the Puerto Rico PEN Award. (PEN is a worldwide writers’ organization.) He has translated the work of poet Stanley Kunitz and is a contributor to the literary supplement of El Nueva Dia, the major newspaper in Puerto Rico.
Avila’s repertoire continues to evolve. In Creature of Oblivion, he departs from the format and style of El Simetria del Timepo, using a more conversational, free-verse style. His poetry books sell well, a fact he attributes to their accessibility to the average reader.
Avila aims to increase that accessibility by translating some of his poems into English. The graduate of a bilingual high school in Puerto Rico (he went on to earn bachelors and masters degrees from the University of Puerto Rico and a Ph.D. from Indiana University of Pennsylvania), Avila has translated some of his poems from Spanish to English. Eventually, he hopes to publish a dual/language volume of selections from among his poems.
Avila’s poetry collections and novels can be purchased through amazon.com. His poetry can be purchased through www.terranovaeditores.com.
To read some of Avila’s poems, followed by their English translations, click here.
