Jorge Guillén’s Las doce en el reloj appeared in his first collection of poems, Cántico (1928). Its theme is the completeness reached at a moment in time—noon, the present—by a man, the poet, immersed in a place, the world, which is perfect. The clause “All is complete,” the poem’s central idea, both opens and closes the poem. Las doce en el reloj exemplifies the serenity and contentment of young Guillén when writing the poems included in this collection.

Like many of these poems, this one uses specific images of reality as universal symbols, and it exhibits some of the fundamental characteristics of Guillén’s style. The world is presented in relation to a perfect geometric form: the circle, noon. Man, the poet, “god” (not capitalized), is at the center of creation, one with nature, and a witness. And nature is described through images that do not reflect a particular place or landscape but symbolize its essence: a poplar tree, a bird, the wind, a flower, stalks of grain. Surrounding them is the Sun, representing love, another of Guillén’s recurring themes—and one that unites all these elements to each other and to the poet.

“Era yo, / Centro en aquel instante / De tanto alrededor, / Quien lo veía todo / Completo para un dios.” (I was the center / of the surroundings, / and saw that it was all / complete for a god.)

The symbolic quality of the images does not detract from the vitality and sensory impact of the poem, expressed through specific colors (silver, green, and gray) and implied color (in the Sun, the bird, the flower, and the grain) and through the movement of “stirred,” and “rustling” in the wind, as well as the emotion of the “adoration” in the bird’s song and of the flower feeling “its praises sung.” The regularity of the rhythm and of the rhyme scheme (the lines are all of seven syllables with the even-numbered ones ending in assonant –o) parallels the symmetry of the poet’s experience.

In Las doce en el reloj, the sentiment of perfection that fills the poet is transmitted undiminished to the reader.

Bibliography
Guillén, Jorge. Our Air. 2 vols. Translated by Carl W. Cobb. Lewiston, N.Y.: Edwin Mellen, 1997.
MacCurday, G. Grant. Jorge Guillén. Boston: Twayne, 1982.

Categories: Literature, Spanish Literature, World Literature

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