No More Clichés Poem by Octavio Paz
No More Clichés
Beautiful face
That like a daisy opens its petals to the sun
So do you
Open your face to me as I turn the page.
Enchanting smile
Any man would be under your spell,
Oh, beauty of a magazine.
How many poems have been written to you?
How many Dantes have written to you, Beatrice?
To your obsessive illusion
To you manufacture fantasy.
But today I won't make one more Cliché
And write this poem to you.
No, no more clichés.
This poem is dedicated to those women
Whose beauty is in their charm,
In their intelligence,
In their character,
Not on their fabricated looks.
This poem is to you women,
That like a Shahrazade wake up
Everyday with a new story to tell,
A story that sings for change
That hopes for battles:
Battles for the love of the united flesh
Battles for passions aroused by a new day
Battle for the neglected rights
Or just battles to survive one more night.
Yes, to you women in a world of pain
To you, bright star in this ever-spending universe
To you, fighter of a thousand-and-one fights
To you, friend of my heart.
From now on, my head won't look down to a magazine
Rather, it will contemplate the night
And its bright stars,
And so, no more clichés.
As a woman, not one who writes, I am honored that there is a man on the planet who thinks like this. Great Job! Now required reading for the girls I mentor, if ya dont mind. Gotta try to get them to set the bar higher.
I think Czyka Tumaliuan hit the nail on the head with the comment offered below. Also, those who are finding various faults with the poem could be right, but I would like to read the poem in its original Spanish to see if it may have received a bad translation here. Does anyone know where I can see a copy of the original?
no spanish version anymore, everyone speake english, other languages are occupied, please give up
This poem is only about the beauty of women.The poet could have written about manh other qualities of women.This is absolutely a stereotypical mindset of judging a women or men with their looks.I think this poem is totally fiIlled with CLICHES
no this is not Clichés this is poem beautiful poem for the beautiful woman .......
A great glowing tribute to the heroic deeds of women and their empowered actions at the same time describing disillusion with physical beauty of women. A well deserved modern pooem of the day.
This poem has not been translated into any other language yet.
I would like to translate this poem
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3/12/2025 7:18:22 PM # 1.0.0
Octavio Paz has written some magnificent poetry and is among my favorite 20th century poets, but this work is only passable. Paz expresses a fine sentiment - namely, that a woman should be appreciated for many reasons, and her looks is the least of them. There is beauty in her charm, intelligence, character, but I fail to see how all this goes beyond the cliches. The last 2 stanzas are particularly poor: I see 2 cliches and 2 trite and prosaic statements. Note: 'bright star in this ever-spending universe', 'world of pain', 'fighter...', and 'contemplate the night and its bright stars'. The first and last of these are certainly cliches, while 'world of pain' and 'fighters...' are trite and prosaic. Many readers judge a poem (falsely) on the basis of whether it agrees with their sensibilities, whether it has certain political content. In short, their judgements are usually emotive, divorced from considerations of craft and artistry. I for one can recognize and laud a poem whose content may be offensive (or at least controversial) , but which is beautifully and originally crafted.