We rescue some verses that the Chilean writer dedicated to Jesus crucified
One of the few women to receive the Nobel Prize in Literature, the Chilean writer Gabriela Mistral , dedicated part of her life to rhyming with great mastery. She did so on many diverse topics and did not forget her Christian roots.
Since she was little, she approached the Bible, which became a reference for her life and work . On these dates of Holy Week, we remember these beautiful verses in which she exposes the authentic essence of the image of Jesus. A Christ that we will only find in the most helpless.
What do you want the image of? The image maker asked:
We have pine saints,
There are images of plaster,
Look at this recumbent Christ,
Pure cedar wood,
It depends on who orders it,
A family or a temple,
Or if the only objective
It’s putting it in a museum.
So let me explain to you,
What I really want.
I need an image
From Jesus the Galileo,
Let it reflect your failure
Trying a new world,
May it move the consciences
And change the thoughts,
I don’t want her locked up
In churches and convents.
Not even in a family home
To preside over your prayers,
It is not to be carried around
Loaded by costaleros,
I want a living image
Of a suffering Jesus Man,
May it illuminate whoever looks at it
The heart and the brain.
Makes you want to download it
Of his cross and torment,
And whoever contemplates that image
Don’t stare at a dead person,
Not even with the eyes of an artist
Just look at an object,
Before the one who exclaims in admiration
What a beautiful tortured man!
Forgive me if I tell you,
The image maker responds,
That here you will not find insurance
The image of the Nazarene.
Go look for her in the streets
Among the homeless people,
In hospices and hospitals
Where there are people dying
In reception centers
In which they abandon old people,
In the marginalized town,
Among the hungry children,
In battered women,
In unemployed people.
But the image of Christ
Don’t look for it in museums,
Don’t look for it in the statues,
In altars and temples.
Don’t even continue in the processions
The steps of the Nazarene,
Don’t look for it made of wood,
Of stone or plaster bronze,
Better look among the poor
His image of flesh and blood
Gabriela Mistral dedicated a good part of her life to improving the education of children and writing beautiful poems that earned her international recognition. In 1945 she was awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature, a prize for which she thanked Christ as soon as she learned that she had received it: “Jesus Christ, make this humble daughter worthy of such a high award!”
The Chilean writer recalled in her conference My Experience with the Bible that it had a great influence on her life: “At the age of ten, I discovered this way of the word, naked and straight, and I adopted it to the extent of my poor means, by pure trial and error, syllabusing her strong verses, stuttering her excellence and getting closer to her, at the same time with love and fear of love.”
Only as a great writer could do, with words, Gabriela Mistral put her talent at the service of God and turned her deepest Christian feelings into beautiful literary works.
