Synkroniciti is excited to welcome Chilean poet Ivan A. Salazar M., based in Canada, with two breathtaking poems about the Chilean mountains and how they symbolize and shape the culture and identity of their people. The love of bright colors and the songs that soar like the wind are gifts from the mountains, showing people how to survive hardship. “In the Springtime Andes” guides us through the stunning Andes at the beginning of spring: “Andes, oh mountains,/ Your peaks kiss the sky,/ But in springtime You awaken with a whisper,/ Flowers bursting from silence, /Women in colors/ On your weathered skin.” Ivan’s beautiful rhythmic poetry resounds with a love for his homeland, lilting with sibilance and alliteration. “Nahuelbuta, Guardian of the Ancients” speaks instead of the coastal mountains, the Nahuelbuta, which are home to the Araucaria araucana, the monkey puzzle tree, and the Indigenous Mapuche people who hold it sacred. The name Araucaria araucana comes from a word the Spanish used for the Mapuche, testament to the tree’s centrality to their identity. “Each needle, a memory,/ A thread of the past,/ Stirring the winds with songs/ Of the Mapuche heart,/ Resilient and fierce,/ Echoing through the valleys,/ As the rivers dance in their embrace.” This is a powerful and beautiful nationalism, which understands that humanity must rely on the earth and nature for sustenance and hope.
Read Ivan’s passionate poems in in Synkroniciti’s “Identity” issue, available for purchase here: https://synkroniciti.com/the-magazine/purchase-individual-issues/
Ivan A. Salazar M., a passionate poet from a land of Nobel laureates, crafts words that resonate with history and reveal the beauty of the human condition. A published author of Temporal Echoes and If You Go South, he connects cultures and hearts through poetry. His two forthcoming collections in early 2025 are Weaver of Dreams and Love, Life, Hope and Other Poems.