In Chile, poetry in bedrock and blood

CNN
October 15, 2010

Since the rescue of 33 miners this week in Copiapó, Chile, the world has turned its attention to that distant southern-cone country, one known for its striking topography, its volcanoes and earthquakes -- including one that devastated the city of Concepción this year -- and its poetry.

Chile is a land of poets, having produced such greats as Nobel-Prize winners Gabriela Mistral and Pablo Neruda as well as world-class practitioners like Vicente Huidobro, Nicanor Parra, Gonzalo Rojas and many, many more.

So it must have come as no surprise to Chileans, I imagine, and was undoubtedly considered a "badge of honor" when Víctor Segovia, one of the Copiapó miners, was dubbed the "mine poet." He had kept a journal and sent messages to the surface of the Atacama Desert during the miners' horrendous ordeal. Víctor Zamora, another of the miners, was also identified as a poet.

One is struck by the contrast between the brutality of the miner's work and this tender impulse to create. One shouldn't be surprised: The miner breathes in rarified minerals -- copper and gold -- till they're in his blood.

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