by Kristen McHenry

Such is the complaint of Rosalía de Castro, early feminist, poet and novelist from the Galician region of Spain. Though her literary talents were disregarded for most of her life, several decades after her death, de Castro’s poetry became a major influence on Fredrico García Lorca and other Spanish Romantic poets. Today, she is revered in Galicia and is considered a champion of the poor and downtrodden.

De Castro was born 1837 into an well-to-do family. At that time in Spain it was traditional for girls of her social standing to be given over as children to rural peasant families, then reclaimed when they came of age. Through this arrangement, de Castro grew up in the impoverished Galicia countryside and developed a deep love of Galician lore and poetry, as well a life-long empathy for the poor and powerless.

When she was 14, she was reclaimed by her mother and enrolled in a girl’s school in Santiago where she studied music, art and writing. But the Galician countryside was in her blood and she was often homesick.  Scholars believe much of the pain and melancholy that permeates her poetry is a result of both the early separation from her mother and her longing to return to Galicia.

“Follas Novas” (“New Medleys”) reflects de Castro’s strong sense of social justice:

Listen! The tax collectors
Are making the run of the hamlet;
But how to pay them, how, if one
Can’t even afford the rent?
“They will impound everything;
Their sort has no conscience or soul.
They will evict us,
Children of my innards!
“May a black hand strike you down
Before you get here…!
How sadly beat the hearts of the poor
When you are near!”
“Mary, if it weren’t
Because there is a God who punishes and rewards,
I would kill those men
Like the fox slays a hen.”
“Silence! Don’t blaspheme,
This is a vale of tears…!
But why must some suffer so much
And others pass their lives in gladness?

Kristen McHenry works on poetry by night and health outreach by day. She created and facilitates the Poet’s Cafe, a weekly poetry workshop for homeless teens. She shares poetry and her thoughts on writing at The Good Typist.