could anyone give me their interpretation of Benjamin Alire Saenz's "To the Desert" please?????
here it is

I came to you one rainless August night.
You taught me how to live without the rain.
You are thirst and thirst is all I know.
You are sand, wind, sun, and burning sky,
The hottest blue. You blow a breeze and brand
Your breath into my mouth. You reach-- then bend
Your force, to break, blow, burn, and make me new.
You wrap your name tight around my ribs
And keep me warm. I was born for you.
Above, below, by you, by you surrounded.
I wake to you at dawn. Never break your
Knot. Reach, rise, blow, Salvame, mi dios,
Tragame, mi tierra. Salva, tragga, Break me,
I am bread. I will be the water for your thirst.
~1995
any help would be greatly appreciated as soon as possible!! thanx



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 04/11/2021 01:42PM by Desi.

I am experiencing the same problem all i know is that the author replaces the word desert for god, I hope this will help u a little. so do you have any idea what the meaning of this poem is? anything at all will be great!!!
as soom as possible. Please
laters

[rpo.library.utoronto.ca]

Good catch, Hugh.

It seems the quote from Donne was not plagiarism, but was intended to be recognised because of the comparable theme. It is italicised in this reproduction of 'To the Desert':

[www.poetryoutloud.org]

The Spanish words are also italicised there, but I can't find that they are quoted from anyone.

Note the accents needed for correct spelling of the Spanish words sálvame and trágame, which I guess mean 'save me' and 'swallow me up' ('mi dios' my god; and 'mi tierra' 'my land', or figuratively 'my desert'). I'm also guessing salva and tragga are general imperative forms of the same verbs, but neither Babelfish nor the Windows XP translation facility recognises tragga.



Edited 6 time(s). Last edit at 04/14/2006 05:33AM by IanB.

"Salvame, mi dios, Tragame, mi tierra. Salva, Traga"= Save me, my God/ Take me, my land. Save me, take me. Tragame literally means "swallow me"

Hints:

This poem is strongly based on the bible. Check out the psalms and the Word of Jesus at the last supper. Biblegate has a keyword search engine that can help you.