Celebrating Modern Poets of the Americas : Readings: Several Latin American poets shared selections from their works in three Orange County cities. The recitals are part of a weeklong festival organized by Cal State Fullerton.

But the lords of darkness (the censors) said, “Let no one approach this tree. Let no one dare pick this fruit.” And a girl whose name was Blood Girl knew this history. The maiden bravely asked, ‘Why can’t I know this tree’s miracle?’ And she jumped over the oppressor’s words of warning and approached the tree. She approached the tree so that the myth could bring us together in its image. Because the woman is the freedom that provokes action. And the hero is the unhindered will.” --From “The Calabash Tree”

by Pablo Antonio Cuadra

Quito Downs, a writer and artist who lives in El Toro, grew up in Nicaragua during the dictatorship of Anastasio Somoza Debayle. As a teen-ager, he voiced his discontent by writing letters to the editor of La Prensa, the country’s only independent newspaper. Several of the letters were published, but Downs left Nicaragua before he got to meet the editor, Pablo Antonio Cuadra, an internationally known poet and journalist who was imprisoned twice by Somoza.

Downs was among the first to arrive to hear Cuadra, now 78, and other poets give recitals Wednesday night at the San Juan Capistrano Regional Library.

Cuadra, who combines the pre-Mayan myths of his homeland with the modern folklore of Central American Indians, read three poems, including “The Calabash Tree,” dedicated to Pedro Joaquin Chamorro, the publisher of La Prensa whose assassination in 1978 was a catalyst for the 1979 Sandinista revolution.

Cuadra originally was a Sandinista supporter but became disillusioned with the movement’s policies and eventually backed the Contras. In retaliation, the Sandinistas shut down La Prensa for 15 months in 1986-87.

He said that the new government--headed by Chamorro’s widow, Violeta Barrios de Chamorro, who defeated Sandinista leader Daniel Ortega in the February presidential election--presents another opportunity for Nicaragua to achieve democracy. The Nicaraguan people, he said, have always loved freedom, but in the past, totalitarian governments have risen from the very revolutions that promised a better life.

Cuadra hopes that this time it will be different, since more countries are turning to democracy. The Eastern Europeans, he said, have helped pave the way.

Cuadra was a member of the 1920s’ Vanguard literary movement, which sought to create a poetry indigenous to Nicaragua, free from European influences imposed by Modernism. He was influenced by the poet and revolutionary Augusto Cesar Sandino, who fought off a U.S. Marine occupation of Nicaragua during the 1920s and 1930s.

Cuadra stepped down recently from his position as editor of La Prensa but still edits the newspaper’s literary supplement.

Colombian poet Juan Gustavo Cobo Borda also read Wednesday, along with Daphne Marlatt of Canada. The readings were part of La Terra Nova 1990, a weeklong festival organized by Cal State Fullerton to celebrate contemporary poetry of the Americas. The festival is a co-production of the Los Angeles Festival and the 1990-1992 Orange County Festival of Discovery.

While Cuadra, Cobo Borda and Marlatt read in San Juan Capistrano, Guatemalan poet Carlos Illescas read at the La Habra Library along with Peruvian poet Blanca Varela. Veronica Volkow of Mexico, Alfonso Barrera Valverde of Ecuador, Gonzalo Rojas of Chile and Eduardo Mitre of Bolivia read at the Corbin Center in Santa Ana.

The lineup, selected by organizers Florinda Mintz and Paul Vangelisti, drew criticism from the Southern California Salvadoran community because it originally included David Escobar Galindo, a Salvadoran poet linked to the right-wing Cristiani government. Galindo eventually canceled so he could attend the United Nations peace talks that resumed this week.

“We never meant to offend anybody,” said Mintz, an Argentine writer who lives in Santa Ana. “The goal was to bring the poets here as individuals and artists, as world citizens.”

The festival closes today after an all-day student poetry workshop at Cal State Fullerton.