If a sense of general alienation and separation from nature and the earth forms a central part of Montejo’s poetics, it is nevertheless important to note that, as with the concern for temporal loss, the setting against which this lamentation is played out is specifically that of a Venezuelan poet in Venezuelan paisajes, with the latter representing tropical and American landscapes more widely. Consequently, there is a need to understand that Montejo’s poetics is concerned not simply with the human condition, but also with the specificities of the Venezuelan condition. It is on this aspect of Montejo’s work that I shall focus in this final chapter.

Journeys, exile, and Venezuela

Certainly, Montejo’s presentation of humankind’s distance from the natural world runs parallel to the notion of a distance from Venezuela. In ‘Las cigarras’ from Algunas palabras, for example, Montejo lauds and affirms cicadas and their song before declaring that ‘sería terrible morir en una tierra | donde no vuelvan las cigarras’ (AP, 33). The ubiquitousness of cicadas in the poet’s homeland identifies the specific locale in question here and thus points up the fear of being and remaining distant from Venezuela. Yet, despite the fear highlighted in this early poem, from Muerte y memoria onwards Montejo’s poetry is replete not only with poems which describe the Venezuelan poet as indeed being distant from his land, but also with poems which focus longingly on foreign places. To name just a few examples: we find the poet in Paris in ‘Cementerio de Vaugirard’ (MM); in Algunas palabras he provides a solemn description of the River Thames in ‘Támesis’ and desires to go to Iceland in ‘Islandia’; and from Trópico absoluto on there are numerous poems placing the poet in, or talking about being in, Lisbon, a place for which he displays a strong affinity, including ‘Lisboa ya lejos’ (TA), ‘Lisboa’ (AS), and ‘Pavana de Lisboa’ (FE).

Many of these poems and places link back to Montejo’s own experiences: Montejo lived in Paris from 1968 to 1971 and was Venezuela’s cultural attaché in Lisbon from 1988 to 1994. The predominant element in these poems, however, is not so much being in foreign places as the act of travelling to and from them, thus tying in with the understanding of life as an ‘errar entre dos nadas’ (‘Una vida’, HS, 23).