New Love Poetry

In 1966, Nicolas Guillen, the acclaimed poet of Cuba, wrote a book of 15 poems dealing with a rupture in his affair with Sara Casal. His poems take the form of a conversation with the absent loved one, and also a series of subtle dialogues with figures in world literature, including Dante, Becquer, Neruda and Rulfo. The volume is bilingual, presenting in Spanish and English, Guillen's poems and Ellis' commentary and notes. As an epilogue, Ellis includes a previously unpublished sonnet by the Cuban poet Eliseo Diego, 'A Sara Casal'. The book is beautifully illustrated with 13 drawings by the Buban painter Ernesto Garcia Pena.