Luisa Pérez de Zambrana: A Singularly Good Poetess
Luisa Pérez y Montes de Oca was born on August 25, 1835, in Melgarejo estate near Cobre town. When she got married with literature critic, intellectual and cultural promoter Ramón Zambrana, she lost her maternal surname and became Mrs. Zambrana.
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Martí described her, in the article he wrote on August 28, 1875, as a pure creature, sensitive, refined and generous. The waved black hair covers her wide temple; her big eyes reflect an endless strength of passion and tenderness; perpetual modesty on her pure and fine-looking features.
That was this beautiful woman that, at the age of 14, wrote her first verses to recreate the bucolic environment where she lived until her father passed away.
Santiago de Cuba, her second home, opened new doors that were not definitive, but strengthened her poetry. The literary circles recognized the quality of her verses because of the clarity of the language.
The Iris, The Dewdrop, Moon Night, To the Sunset, Julia and the Escape of the Mockingbirdor An Offering to the Virgin are some of the poems relate to her hometown.
Luisa published a group of poems that was spread among the most prestigious intellectuals in the province and the country in an effort to gain recognition, but she also found love.
Ramón Zambrana and Luisa got married on September 16, 1858, and they had five children. That was when she started to develop her social and intellectual life in the capital of the country.
She had her second poem volume published on such newspapers as La Habana, Cuba Poética, Álbum cubano de lo bueno y de lo bello, La Verdad Católica, Cuba Literaria and Diario de la Marina. This volume was dedicated to her new life: To my Husband; My White House; To the Country; Hymn to my Mother, Melancholy, among many others.
Havana also boosted her poetic work, since she visited literary gatherings, just like the one organized by Nicolás Azárate, and she crowned Gertrudis Gómez de Avellaneda in 1860, at Tacón Theater. She also suffered the heart-breaking pain caused by the loss of her family.
Suddenly, this romantic woman was alone in the world. Her husband died eight years after they got married, followed by their each of their children and even her sister Lucía, who was also a poetess.
The profound suffering of Luisa de Zambrana was shed on her poems, which stand among the most remarkable pieces of the 20th century literature and are described as one of the finest in Cuba and Spanish America.
Her work was characterized by its sensitivity, melancholy, tenderness and religious and philosophic reflections. The last two characteristics stand out in elegies Back to the Forest, a tribute to her husband, and Supreme Pain and Torment, dedicated to her children.
Enrique José Varona described her as the most notable elegiac of our lyrical authors, and Martí commented on her work: the verses are written out of nobility, but poetry is only born out of feeling.
This matchless poetess passed away at the age of 87 in Regla, on May 25, 1922.
