Valencia

All Poems, For Children, Spain, Trips and Places, Valencia, Wisdom

Juan Luis Vives

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Our address in Valencia, 4 Luis Vives.

Street honoring the humanist scholar.

Born here in 1493.

At a time when being Jewish, dangerous, lethal.

So, the family converted to Catholicism.

Vives residing here till age fifteen.

Fleeing after his mother’s death from the plague.

While in England, learning tragic news.

His father and other family members, executed.

Despite being conversos.

Killed for covering up their Judaism.

Vives was living with Thomas Moore.

Tutoring Mary, daughter of the king.

But lost favor for disapproval of King Henry VIII’s annulment.

From Catherine of Aragon.

He escaped to Brussels.

Where he wrote tirelessly.

Prolific on many themes.

Education, care of the poor, gender roles.

Medicine, the soul.

Learning, memory.

Earning the epithet Father of Psychology.

Maybe even Godfather of Psychoanalysis.

For acknowledgment of the unconscious.

Though working in the Renaissance,

today still his advice applies.

Memorize one thing every day,

or your memory slowly dies.

 

Lynn Benjamin

February 3, 2024

Converso: A Spanish Jew who converted to Christianity outwardly to protect him/herself from persecution or expulsion, though often practicing Judaism in secret.

Adult Children, All Poems, Family, Farewell, Food, Grandchildren, Museums, Spain, Trips and Places, Valencia

Sunday in Valencia With Katusha and her Papa

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Sunday in Valencia is strolling.

With a loved one or friend.

Or with your family.

Maybe running through a museum.

Eating paella for comida.

So we were determined.

To be Valencianos for a day.

Starting with watching regional dancing in the Plaza.

Women, men in traditional garb.

Doing boleros, fandangos, jotas.

Clicking castenets.

Singing in Valenciano

Till it was time to walk through Turia Park.

To the Museo Fallero.

Study prize winning ninots.

Comment on the parodies.

Staying till doors closed.

Heading again toward the park.

Ambulating like a wave.

With masses of walkers, bikers, kids on scooters.

Toward the City of Arts and Sciences.

To a whole new set of wanderers.

Finding passage beside pools, palms.

Finally catching a taxi.

To the promenade along the beach.

Joining up with yet more ramblers.

On the walkway, the shore.

Urging Katusha to climb ropes on the sand.

Partake of Sunday exhilaration.

Continue to Casa Carmela for late comida.

After smelling every kind of paella in eateries along the way.

To our surprise, being seated in a private room.

Where we lingered for hours.

Feasting on dried tuna, cuttlefish, salad.

Black squid paella and prawn paella.

Flan and squash cake.

Till cabbing back to the old city.

Resuming our constitutional.

With the remaining Sunday marchers.

Retracing steps along plazas.

Past the statue of the River Turia.

To both old city gates and back.

For this was the last day in Valencia

for Katusha and our son.

We hoped to blend right in

with energetic motion.

 

Lynn Benjamin

February 3, 2024

Museo Fallero is the museum of the Fallas, the Valencian festival in March when people who live in Valencia build giant figures, usually parodies of the period. On March 19, these figures are burned except for two that are rescued from the flames. The museum houses those that have been rescued through the years.

Ninots: The figures that are built during the Fallas. Ninot is a Valencian word that means doll.

 

 

 

All Poems, For Children, Spain, Stories, Trips and Places, Valencia

Pedal Boat

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Please, Papa, come ride a pedal boat with us, Katusha begged.

As we ate comida on a sidewalk.

Not far from the Bioparc and Parque de Cabecera.

Having just rented a pedal boat.

After our trek through the zoo.

But her father missed the morning.

So she wanted him to have the experience.

With a different boat.

Since the swan she chose was tall.

Wouldn’t pass under the bridge.

Forcing us to spend most of the half-hour rental turning around.

In a very narrow space.

Forward, back.

Forward, back.

Between reeds and trees.

Even so, Katusha found steering exhilarating.

Hence, imploring her father to do it with her.

How could he refuse?

So, we caught a taxi.

Motored back to the park.

Where Katusha chose a duck boat.

With a head low enough to miss the bridge.

She and her papa sat in front.

I and her grandfather, in back.

She delighted in directing the route.

But reprimanded her father.

Each time he lifted feet off the pedals.

For his legs,  long.

Knees aching.

He wanted to rest.

But, Katusha wouldn’t have it.

Pedal, Papa, she exhorted.

Each time, he, relenting.

As we gazed at ducks.

Saturday picnickers on the banks.

Families sipping beverages at the café.

Tall grasses and fountains.

Katusha pushed us forward.

The princess at the helm.

Her goal and purpose clear:

circumnavigate her realm.

 

Lynn Benjamin

February 2, 2024

 

 

Adult Children, All Poems, Animals/Insects, Children, Emotions, Family, Grandchildren, Spain, Trips and Places, Valencia

Bioparc

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What about the Bioparc? I proposed.

An option for Saturday morning.

Katusha, enthused, looked up.

Yes, I love animals!

Her father, less excited.

Zoos are everywhere. They’re not culturally Spanish, he said.

But this one’s special, I attempted to persuade.

Natural habitats for animals.

Grouping by geography.

Madegascar, Congo Basin, Wetlands, Savannah.

Caves, aquariums, forests.

A safari, on foot.

Signs in Spanish.

Elefantes, hipopótamos, jirafas.

Parents coaxing children.

Ven, mira, sube.

Commenting, qué lindo, precioso, chulo.

Though her papa not convinced,

we made our expedition.

Katusha adventuring in Bioparc

despite Papa’s admonition.

 

Lynn Benjamin

February 1, 2024

 

 

All Poems, Spain, Time, Trips and Places, Valencia

Four Weeks to Four Days

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How did our month in Valencia shrink?

From four weeks to four days?

Does time go by faster here?

Is it the novelty?

So many new things to observe, do?

Or does it just slip by unnoticed?

While visiting with friends?

With son and granddaughter?

Who knows the why?

Or the how?

But impossible to hold it back

like a river flowing.

No point pushing against the rush.

Paddle onward, keep rowing.

 

Lynn Benjamin

January 29, 2024

 

 

Adult Children, All Poems, Art/Arts, Family, Grandchildren, Museums, Spain, Trips and Places, Valencia

Twice

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Have you ever wanted to do something twice?

Within a short time span?

Re-read a book?

Re-see a film, a play?

Here in Valencia, I had that chance.

To go a second time to the Hortensia Herrero Arts Center.

With my son and granddaughter.

To sense again the marriage of bygone and fresh.

Revisit the Roman circus.

Walls of the judería.

Underneath the renovated Valeriola Palace.

Now populated with twenty-first century art.

I wanted to show them everything.

Re-trace my own steps.

Especially on the second floor.

To stand once more in front of Manolo Valdés.

Valencian artist with a knack.

For taking the ancient.

Making it novel.

Challenging viewer to know history.

Crafts, archeology, iconography.

Fans painted over burlap.

Glass-like figure of Queen Mariana.

Head framed with multi-colored glass shapes.

Reminding me of the monumental blue glass.

Dama Ibérica near the soccer stadium.

Giant yellow butterfly atop female head in Alicante.

If not for Hortensia Herrero,

Monolo Valdés, I’d not meet.

Not ever knowing what I’d miss.

Sensibilities incomplete.

 

Lynn Benjamin

February 1, 2024

All Poems, Family, Grandchildren, People Traits, Spain, Trips and Places, Valencia

My Body Adjusts

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My body adjusts to new environments, said Katusha.

Dancing down the street.

Not the least bit tired.

After arriving on two flights to Valencia.

With her father from JFK.

Ready to taste new flavors.

Churros and chocolate.

Visit new places.

El Mercado central.

The Serrano Gate.

Turia Gardens.

Eat paella for comida.

Sit the requisite two hours of sobremesa.

Then climb up and down three flights of stairs.

Through Hortensia Herrero’s Contemporary Art Center.

Interacting with the pieces.

Mat Collishaw’s Fallas.

Sean Scully’s Chapel.

Olafur Eliasson’s Tunnel of Glass.

Cristina Iglesias’s cave-like passageway.

Manolo Valdés’s sculptures.

Skip out the door to la Plaza de la Reina.

To join the throngs at a café.

Delight that it was still afternoon at 8pm.

My body adjusts to new environments.

And, indeed, Katusha was right.

Though the Spanish afternoon, long,

she was loath to say goodnight.

 

Lynn Benjamin

February 1, 2024

All Poems, Animals/Insects, Gardens, Plants, Spain, Trees, Trips and Places, Valencia

Jardines del Turia

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Turia Gardens are our go-to place to stroll in Valencia.

An urban park, nine kilometers long.

Divided into sixteen sections.

Dedicated in 1986.

After a decision to re-route the Turia River.

Due to persistent flooding.

To turn the riverbed into green space.

For joggers, bikers, skateboarders.

Birders, dog walkers, family groups.

For people like us.

Who love to walk.

To admire flora, fauna.

Walls of purple bougainvilleas.

Red geraniums, rose beds.

Catalpa trees, pines, palms.

Jacarandas, Baobabs.

Swimming fish.

Cooing pigeons.

To listen to sounds.

Burbling fountains.

Children hollering in excitement.

Enjoying slides.

Climbing on a giant Gulliver.

The park is our after-comida place.

To calmly meander.

The place where we fancy ourselves most Valencian.

Most blended with the locals.

Though they walk by unfazed by screeching monk parrots.

Those green birds we spotted last year in Málaga.

While we stop at the sounds of screaming, shrieking.

Look up into the trees.

Wait for them to land near us.

Greet us.

Like old buddies.

Reconnecting after a long absence.

Joyful when they do.

Pecking at grasses by our feet.

Drinking from a puddle.

Even cuddling with each other on a branch.

That encounter, the capstone of our ramble.

If I were to be honest,

though Turia Park, a marvel,

what intrigues me most of all,

the monk parrots’ noisy garble.

 

Lynn Benjamin

January 31, 2024

 

 

 

 

All Poems, Art/Arts, Trips and Places, Valencia

In Search of More Sorolla

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The day was perfect.

To see the Museum of Fine Arts in Valencia.

Second in size only to the Prado in Madrid.

Housed in a building from 1683.

San Pío Seminary College.

We knew we couldn’t get through it all.

So, we went in search of more art by Sorolla.

Which occupied two large halls.

I stood before his paintings.

Studied them.

Figuras de casacas jugando en un jardín.

Labradora Valenciana.

Grupa Valenciana.

People in Valencian dress.

With Valencian hair styles.

Under Valencian sun.

When I was ambushed by a thought.

An unexpected aha moment.

Forgotten in the details of ordinary life.

But, it was the light in Sorolla’s brushstrokes.

Exposing a long-buried desire.

The one planted decades ago.

Contemplating his works.

In the Hispanic Museum of America.

In New York City.

Where Sorolla had mounted fourteen canvases.

Each a region of Spain.

With people in provincial costumes.

Displaying typical foods.

Colorful, buoyant.

Alluring.

Drawing me into the scenes.

Farmers, fishermen, villagers.

As if they were alive.

Beckoning me.

To be there.

Enter their world.

Hear them speak.

Find joy in their communities.

Before the sweep of global change

would whitewash popular folkways.

Would bring the march of progress

obliterating mores,

I made it late to Valencia.

But in time to search for traces

outside of museums, monuments,

in the streets, on peoples’ faces.

Though society has plunged us

into twenty-first century advances,

some vestiges still remain,

in words, cuisine, folk dances.

 

Lynn Benjamin

January 31, 2024

All Poems, Art/Arts, Gardens, Plants, Spain, Trips and Places, Valencia

From the Botanical Gardens Past La Dama Ibérica

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We were on a plant and flower high.

As we bounded down the street.

Walking toward Turia Park.

To find our way back to the old city.

After a wander through the Botanical Gardens.

Managed by José Pizcueta Donay, physician and botanist.

From 1829 until 1870.

Today, extensive and abundant.

Aquatic, rockery plants.

Cacti, citrus trees, vines.

Orchids, Bromeliads, Pteridophytes.

Carnivorous and shade plants, palms.

Neatly organized, cared for.

Calming, meditative.

Still in an altered state, we spotted it.

A monumental, blue head.

Twenty-two thousand ceramic pieces.

Assembled by Manolo Valdés.

There she stood.

A woman with Celtiberian headdress.

Evoking la Dama de Elche.

Fourth century Iberian artifact.

Found in La Alcudia.

But, there was Valdés’s piece

on the roundabout before our eyes.

A moment in time to savor.

To tarry, contemplate, memorize.

 

Lynn Benjamin

January 30, 2024