By: Celia Molina Sánchez | May 11, 2021
An event that was thought from its beginnings as the Festival of Young Poetry in Cuba, these days it will come again to the City of Portals. That journey that began in 1994 in the hands and will of Iliana Álvarez,promoted by others such as Arlen Regueiro and Heriberto Machado, today it has the prestige of a national event and it is named the Floral Games.
In the garden, from the initial spring, these bulbs carried the aroma of the best Cuban poetry, corroborated in the Spring Poetry Prize, from the jury and the young people who participated in it and managed to reach the finals. For a significant number of winners this was the beginning of a lustrous career, and thus, between experiences, floral nights and poetic recitals, Ciego de Ávila became the Cuban capital of this literary genre, at least during the month of May.
The year 2021 continues to fill us with uncertainty as a result of the isolation caused by the relentless proximity of Covid-19; and the cultural panorama does not escape it. However, the appropriate uses of virtual platforms have enhanced the development and scope of proposals in this sector. The Floral Games 2021 will not be the first virtual event launched by the Ciego de Ávila`s AHS, since The Public Key took this place; but it will surely be an event to take place from May 26 to 29, which will mark the maturity, coherence and attractiveness that the work on social networks by this institution has reached up to this point.
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The poetic recitals to which we are accustomed will not be lacking, in fact, they will be enriched, because among the benefits of moving to the virtual world, there is the reduction of borders, geographical distances; everything is just between megabytes and connectivity. Then, we can be surprised and enjoy the verses in their own voices of the award winners throughout all these years among the participants of the event. The finalists of this edition will also have a reading space and some of the previously awarded notebooks will be presented.
The presence of the trova has been an element that has been attached in a special way to this event since its genesis, some of the most assiduous to the floral nights remember how well-known artists wore sung verses in our city, Ariel Barreiros is undoubtedly an example of it. In the current program we will find a space dedicated to these sung nostalgies, while the night becomes a city, then it will arrive to supply this need.
The poetry dedicated to the smallest of the house, "only in physical dimensions", will be in charge of Leo Buquet, winner of the Poetry of Spring 2019 prize, in a space that takes the name of one of his own notebooks, Children this big. In the evenings we will be able to enjoy brief interviews with some of the winners in the first stage of the event, such as Masiel Mateo, whose statements contribute to place the Ciego de Ávila`s award in significance as the imminent trigger of future literary triumphs, in The Garden of Poetry.
A whole ode to the young lyre is then finalized in Ciego de Ávila, book presentations, recitals, trova in verses, interviews, audiobooks. The poetry festival is vitalized in these times and its main catalyst is the will whose essence lies in the Hermanos Saíz Association, always supported by the Provincial Book Center in this province and who will be announcing the next laureate notebook on May 29th. The appointment is at the end of this month, but from now on, on the official page of the Floral Games you can find content related to the event, because virtual flowers will also have their game this year and in what way!