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Question SA-12. Here is the text reference (p. 161/poem):

"Simple Verses" by José Martí

 

I am a sincere man

born where the palm trees grow;

and before dying, I want

to release these verses from my soul.

 

I come from all places,

and to all places I go;

art I am among the arts;

and in the hills I am hill.

 

I know all the strange names

of the herbs and the flowers,

of mortal trickery,

and sublime pain.

 

I have seen the dark night

rain upon my head

and the rays of pure light

coming from divine beauty.

 

I have seen wings born on shoulders

of beautiful women,

and butterflies flying up

out of the debris.

 

I have seen a man

with a dagger in his side,

who never spoke the name

of the woman who killed him.

 

Quick, like a reflection,

twice I have seen a soul, twice:

first when the old man died

and then when she said goodbye to me.

I trembled once - at the grating,

at the entrance of my vineyard -,

when the savage bee

stung my little girl's forehead.

 

I felt pleasure, of a sort

that I never felt before: when

the warden, crying

read my death sentence.

 

I hear a sigh over

land and the seas,

yet it is not a sigh, it is

my son about to awaken.

 

If they say take from the jeweler

the best of his jewels,

I take a sincere friend

and set aside love.

 

I have seen the wounded eagle

fly the serene blue sky,

and I've seen the lair

where the poisonous viper dies.

 

I know full well that when the world

surrenders, tired, to rest,

that over the deep silence

the quiet stream murmurs.

 

I have put a daring hand,

stiff with horror and joy,

to touch the burned-out star

that fell at my front door.

 

I hide in my wild chest

the pain that wounds me:

the son of an enslaved people

lives for it, is quiet, and dies.

 

All is beautiful and constant,

all is music and reason,

and all, just like the diamond

is coal before light comes.

 

I know that the stupid man is buried

with great pomp and many tears,

and that there is no fruit on earth

quite like the cemetery's.

 

I am silent, and I remove

the pomp of the verse-maker;

I hang up on a withered tree

my academic gown.