On May 1, 1808, the volcano at Pico de Boa Esperança near Urzelina, São Jorge, began erupting. To commemorate its 185th anniversary, Urbano Bettencourt composed the poem “Urzelina 93,” which he later published in his 2005 anthology Lugares Sombras e Afectos, with illustrations by Seixas Peixoto.

On the bicentennial of the Urzelina eruption, an azulejo plaque with Peixoto’s artwork and the poem’s text was dedicated at the site of the church bell tower, which had been half-buried by ash from the volcano.

Plaque commemorating the bicentennial of Pico de Boa Esperança’s eruption: “1808 ~ Duzentos anos da erupção do
Vulcão da Urzelina ~ 2008.”

— Photo by John J. Baker, 2018.

Urbano Bettencourt: “Urzelina 93″

Para José Guilherme T. Machado

São de fogo ainda os olhos
dos peixes sob estas águas rubras
em mil oitocentos e oito,
e selectas as laranjas
desse Maio, suspensas
entre ramo e o gesto de colhê-las
(Laranjas de sangue quem as colherá?
Nanja o Roberto,
que não é de cá).
A Torre Velha vela o tempo
do Canal
e às Trovas de Lacerda assinala
o adagio assai do andamento:
“Tenho tantas saudades como areias tem o mar…”
— a que rocha se acolherá
o pássaro que na voz
de Margarida ganha altura?
Como Ulisses recuso a surdez:
ergo do chão a vara poupada pelo fogo,
a ela me prenderei enquanto vogo
de costa a costa
de ilha a ilha.

Urbano Bettencourt ~ “Urzelina 93″
Translated by Katharine F. Baker

For José Guilherme T. Machado

They are still ablaze, the eyes
of the fishes under these blood-red waters
in eighteen-hundred-eight,
and they are select, the oranges
of that May, suspended

between the branch and the act of picking them
(Blood oranges, who will pick them?
Not Roberto,
who isn’t from around here).
The Old Bell Tower stands guard
over the Channel
and to Lacerda’s ballads it marks
the adagio assai of their tempo:
“I have as many saudades as the sea has grains of sand…”
— what cliff will shelter
the bird that, in the voice
of Margarida gains altitude?
Like Ulysses I reject deafness:
I raise from the ground the stick spared by the fire,
I shall cling to it as I row
from shore to shore
from island to island.

Katharine F. Baker beside plaque with Urbano Bettencourt’s poem “Urzelina 93.”

— Photo by Pedro M.S. Noronha, May 2008.