Pérolas para Cummings

"Pérolas para Cummings" Translation

The poem "pérolas para cummings" (English: pearls for cummings)  was written in homage to E. E. Cummings' centenary in 1994. Its language is Portuguese. In the original setting the image of a pearl replaces the letters "o" and  (in the last line) the letters "r" and/or "u". Converted into simple types (with an "o" instead of a pearl)  it reads:

quem
o
tivo

olev
o
uavi

verj
o
gand

opér
o
lasp

arap
o
ocos

Portuguese: (in conventional form): "Que motivo o levou a viver jogando pérolas para porcos (para poucos)?"

English:  "For what reason you passed your life throwing pearls before swine [for the few]?" In Portuguese, the word "porcos" means "swine",and the word "poucos", "the few",  so that the changing of just one letter or "pearl" allows the shifting of meaning.

—Augusto de Campos


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