The work of this poet, like others of his period, has sometimes been considered inferior to that of Manuel de Zequeira, due to its thematic affinity and neoclassical flavor, but without achieving the same results as the author of “Ode to the Pineapple.” However, a sentimental tone is more evident than the rational restraint characteristic of this movement; Rubalcava’s immediate sensitivity and sensoriality offer a more spontaneous Cuban style, free from the intellectualization of phenomena, felt through the skin and transpired in verses of a more authentic lyricism.

One of her best-known poems, “A Nise embroidering a bouquet,” recreates the spring motif that runs through almost all of her poetry, inspired by sunrises, births, germinations, as a festive song to life always seen in its luminosity, from a rather light perspective, which does not seek to interpret but to feel through all the senses:

“It is not just the need
Supreme inventor of things
When from between your exquisite hands
A blooming spring is born

Silk in its different colors
It takes various capricious forms
That learning with your fingers to be roses
They live without withering forever

It seems to me that seeing you high
Near the frame, giving it life,
Flora comes out to look at you, embarrassed;

Come, see your work better woven
That yours of April, remains angry,
And without further ado, she left.”

About this piece, Lezama said: “This is a poem that every Cuban has known by heart since their most basic years of learning, and truly, it deserves to be, because over time, it cannot be missing from a collection of our best sonnets (…) When Nise embroiders, she invents a blossoming spring. The colored silk diversifies into whimsical shapes, but in Nise’s fingers they learn to be roses that never wither, that enjoy eternal life. Flora, embarrassed, goes out to see Nise near the frame, giving stitches of life. Rubalcava surprisingly equates the artisan with nature.”

One of the pillars of his poetry was the fleeting nature of time, expressed in the symbol of the passing stream, related to the dialectical concepts synthesized in the phrase “a man does not step twice into the same river,” the foam, the smoke, the transience over transcendence. This brings him somewhat closer to Romanticism, although his verses are populated by Greco-Latin figures so revisited by neoclassical poetics.

Another of his most anthologized poems is “Cuban Silva,” thematically related to “Ode to the Pineapple.” Its title alludes to the type of metrical combination, where heptasyllabic and hendecasyllabic verses alternate, without adhering to a specific stanza structure, although in this silva each stanza is made up of six lines. It constitutes what might be called a lyrical inventory of Cuban fruits, a precursor to the currents of autochthony in terms of the typicality of the island’s nature, an aspect that is integrated into the flow toward the awareness of nationality.

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Title of the point: The work of Manuel Justo de Rubalcava, one of the first poets

Description of the point: The work of Manuel Justo de Rubalcava has similar characteristics to those of Manuel de Zequeira, highlighting the insular from a neoclassicism more anchored in the immediacy of sensations than in the formal workmanship typical of this movement.

Key words and phrases: Manuel Justo de Rubalcava, Manuel de Zequeira, neoclassicism, Cuban silva. Nise embroidering a bouquet, a spring motif in her poetry, 19th century Cuban poets, manifestations of neoclassicism in Cuba, spontaneous Cubanness, necessity is not the sole supreme inventor of things when, in your exquisite hands, a flourishing spring is born, José Lezama Lima, Cuban literature, the emergence of nationality in Cuban poetry, fleetingness in Rubalcava’s poetics, the use of Greco-Latin figures in Cuban poetry, beginnings of romanticism in Cuba, lyrical inventory of Cuban fruits, antecedents of Siboneyism, neoclassical poetics and its cultivators in Cuba, Cuban poetry in the period from 1790 to 1868, configuration of national identity through poetry, Silk in its different colors takes on diverse capricious forms, which, learning to be roses in your fingers, live without withering eternally, the neoclassicism movement in Cuba

2.1.3 The poetry of Manuel María Pérez y Ramírez (1772 – 1851)

Manuel María Pérez y Ramírez was very close to Manuel de Zequeira and Manuel Justo de Rubalcava, both military men. He professed unfaltering admiration for the former, which he expressed in his lyrics. He even considered his lyre “poor and inadequate” for singing the praises of his fellow countryman’s. He also took it upon himself to publish Rubalcava’s poem, “Death of Judas,” after the author’s death.

Humility was one of Pérez and Ramírez’s most outstanding characteristics, closely linked to which is the ethical and religious sense expressed in his works, his praise of Christian poverty, and the devotion he placed in the feeling of friendship.

His best-known poem is entitled “A Reconciled Friend”:

“By some unforeseen accident
A crystal glass often breaks
It involves welding with thin varnish
And finally we manage to see him stuck:

But no matter how much you rush your care
The rarest and most unusual ingenuity,
Leaving it without a signal is madness,
There are always signs of bankruptcy.

This is a very tough friendship;
The friendship that was beautiful is broken,
Time welds it with its great wisdom;

It is true that friendship is seen as a whole
But with the sign of breaking
“It can never be the same as it was before.”

He was one of the most cultured men of his time and is said to have founded around eleven periodicals between 1810 and 1824; however, his poetic work was not collected in a single volume, but rather in fragments that appeared sporadically, many of which have not survived to posterity.

He is known to have written a drama titled “Marco Curcio,” of which there is no record today. He also wrote sacramental plays, which were set to music by the prominent composer Esteban Salas.

Poetry was one of several cultural and scientific lines that he developed, and he was even a professor of Félix Varela. Perhaps this broad outlook influenced a certain prose-like tone in his lyrical work, which nevertheless seems to have had a certain quality worthy of note.

His work was not very prolific, and is even absent from the dictionary of Cuban literature; but the trio he forms with the two poets cited above—Manuel de Zequeira and Manuel Justo de Rubalcava—constitutes a highly interesting aspect for understanding this period of Cuban poetry and the manifestations of neoclassicism.