#canto
O Cântico do Douro que Ainda Não Foi Ouvido
No princípio não foi o mercado.
Nem o preço.
Nem o contrato.
Foi a terra.
E antes da terra, foi o silêncio.
Um silêncio antigo, mais velho que impérios,
onde o xisto se partiu para dar lugar à raiz,
e a raiz chamou o homem.
Ali nasceu o Douro
não como região,
mas como consciência viva.
Entre montanhas que falam em ecos de Mesopotâmia,
nos gestos herdados de Anatólia,
e na memória líquida do Mediterrâneo,
o vinho sempre foi mais do que bebida:
foi ponte.
foi sangue.
foi linguagem entre deuses e homens.
E no Douro
esse altar inclinado sobre o tempo
o vinho não se faz:
revela-se.
Mas eis que chegaram os números,
as contas frias,
os mercados sem rosto.
E aquilo que era sagrado
foi medido em cêntimos.
Aquilo que era herança
foi reduzido a custo.
Aquilo que era destino
foi negociado como excedente.
E o homem do Douro
guardião de séculos,
filho do sol e da pedra
foi empurrado para a margem
daquilo que ele próprio criou.
Mas há leis que não se escrevem em papel.
Há leis que vivem na terra.
E a terra…
nunca esquece.
Tal como nas vinhas antigas,
onde cada cepa guarda a memória de mil estações,
também o Douro guarda uma verdade inevitável:
Nenhum sistema que nega o valor da origem
pode sobreviver ao tempo.
Hoje fala-se de aguardente,
de dentro e de fora,
de custos e equilíbrios.
Mas isso é apenas a superfície.
Porque no fundo
no fundo verdadeiro
a questão é outra:
Quem tem o direito de definir o valor daquilo que nasce da terra?
O Viticultor não responde com revolta.
Responde com visão.
Porque ele sabe:
o Douro não precisa de gritar.
Precisa de despertar.
E esse despertar virá.
Como veio o vinho às civilizações antigas,
como veio a luz às catedrais invisíveis do espírito,
como vem sempre a verdade
quando o tempo amadurece.
Haverá um tempo
não anunciado por decretos,
nem controlado por interesses
em que:
a aguardente voltará à sua origem
o vinho voltará à sua dignidade
e o homem voltará ao centro do valor
Nesse tempo,
o Douro deixará de pedir permissão.
E passará a afirmar-se
como aquilo que sempre foi:
um dos últimos territórios sagrados do mundo.
E então,
quem hoje compra barato
terá de aprender a respeitar.
Quem hoje controla
terá de aprender a partilhar.
E quem sempre resistiu
em silêncio, em pedra, em suor
será finalmente reconhecido.
Porque o vinho…
não esquece quem o fez nascer.
E a terra…
não trai quem a honra.
🌿 Victor Marques
Douro
Mar 31
Mar 31, 2026 at 7:51 AM UTC
Freya
Shield-Maiden, Lover
Sister, Mother
Embraces owing
Life unfolding
Blessings upon the fiery hearth
Tears above
Love below: relieve our toil
Darkness ebbing
Rhyme unending
Listen to my bold tale!
Freya
Red hair flowing
Sunlight growing
Rising upon the hill
A song of springtime
Complete this bold rhyme
Hear now my tale!
Set out into the dark forest with newly picked flowers for the hearth, grasped within a meager coat. Clutched in bare hands and protected against her chest from the cold wind which blew so insistent. She was not far from the village when she met a woman on the road.
"A penny for your thought? A purpose for your soul?”
“I do not think so.”
Mysterious crones on a lonely road.
“Perhaps mittens to keep an old woman’s hands warm?” scratched the voice of the Crone.
The girl who wished to be on her way produced one flower from her coat,
“May the thorns keep your hands warm as they do mine.”
Fresh blood dripping from the open wound,
the Crone graciously accepted the rose.
“For this trouble” she said “I will return a favor of my choosing...for you did not give me what I asked... I give a warning. You may not know of such things, but on this night, in these hills is a crone not unlike me. When she asks a favor of someone, and they do not give it to her...she takes them, then buries them in her garden to make the spring come faster. She always asks for that which cannot be given. The snow cover and the full moon coming will sneak night upon you. Wherever you are heading you must stay the night. For if you travel back you will surely lose your way and find yourself food for the flowers.”
The girl who had been taught to be polite even to witches nodded and replied,
"Thank you for your gift.”
She headed on her way not believing a word of what the old Crone said.
Still this dread loom is woven with defeat. Even for the gods who would keep us safe from evil, and guard us from death 'till the end of days was determined.
I say for us all in this song that after light had dropped, the first of the frost did melt.
Sep 15, 2021
Sep 15, 2021 at 8:31 PM UTC
Please don’t mind me,
I’m just a splinter of the past.
Wandering blindly,
and hands are tied so I can’t grasp.
Just like the thought,
of giving up after giving all I’ve got,
I admit that it wasn’t a lot.
Now it’s too late to pretend
that I’m not broken; could be so easy to mend,
I’ll hide the shatter point where you made me bend.
I’ll return to my other fix,
it succeeds in dulling my heart with it’s mind tricks,
a perfect combination just mix and blend.
Nightly I lay awake
sketching scenarios involving us,
where you give and I take,
I return equal amounts; a benefit of respect & trust.
When it’s time to fill in each word,
I admit I’m aware I’m not what she deserves,
someone better who won’t lose their nerve.
‘Cause it’s too late to pretend
that it’s not plagued in every thought I spend,
should be thankful that I’m important enough to still be called friend.
And there’ll always be somebody else,
completely oblivious to a heart’s wealth,
and too focused on their self to ever expend.
We can’t fix the mistake
but we can make a new one;
drain each ocean and lake,
and completely block out the sun.
Yes it’s too late too pretend
that you’re not draped in every word I’ve penned,
even with the lowest odds I’ll still contend.
And do you see each blow and broken bone,
wishing that I’d just leave and find a home?
On me you can depend to not be alone,
do you think the same you could lend?
Oct 8, 2019
Oct 8, 2019 at 2:12 AM UTC
Ascending to the second layer,
a stench of nauseating breath
expands across the zephyr.
I attempt to avoid a cough
and the opaque fog thickens
as we reach an abrupt drop-off.
Depicted below are frantic beings
who have only the remembrance of
anxiety, torment, and panicked feelings
hiding amongst the remaining rubble
in a soft whisper they beg for mercy,
neglecting against their fatal,
violent destruction on the vitality of the innocent.
The scent swells to an intense sickening
along with the dryness of incalescence.
A low growl begins to rise!
Traveling across the infinite distance,
a foul creature comes to brutalize.
The petrified beings cower in their hideouts
and I hold my breath carefully as
three giant, damp, and cold snouts
emerge from the heavy smog.
A rush of frigid wind washes over
and I come to realize, it is the Watchdog.
One risks a dangerous error
in the act of running to the void, but
the motion distracts the devious hunter.
He strikes and pins the immoral,
viciously tearing the flesh to pieces.
Finally, taking him in the muzzle
Cerberus violently tosses the limp body
for it no longer contains value nor interest.
And I ask my Lover very faintly:
“What becomes of the one enduring torture?”
And he, nonchalantly: “Don’t worry, my dearest.
They have yet to regain their composure.”
As we escape from the horror below
to the unknown exceeding cruel,
the dying mortal begins to regrow.
Dec 21, 2016
Dec 21, 2016 at 7:26 PM UTC
Upon entering the vast crystal dome
we venture through the endless
that such vile creatures call home.
Before me, occurring a ghastly sight
of those cursed to these depths
are confined to the blackest night.
Embedded into the surrounding walls,
irregularity complicates the network
when one wanders the immortal halls
of a timeless place that captures its victims
to intensify the thoughts inside their head,
eluding the state of true mortem.
With heavy rope held agonizingly tense
woven within their eyes and mouth
blocking all intellection of the sense,
the creatures meander aimlessly forevermore
nervous and cautious of their movements,
bloodied and grimy from the soot-ridden floor.
I question my Lover out of curiosity:
“Why must these souls dwell in a daunting
labyrinth without physical perceptivity?”
And the Lover addressed sweetly: “My one and only,
Greed is a moral infection of the human mind,
be wary of the heart and the desire Lustfully.”
He then turned, and I followed him through
up to a Beast whom I would not dare test
for he validates the lack of your virtues.
Dec 18, 2016
Dec 18, 2016 at 9:40 PM UTC
Awoken in a wood of dark and eerie
I find myself alone and lost with
an arising feeling of anxiety
amidst the ash in the thick air
that leaves a sour and bitter taste,
filling my lungs with despair.
The sudden unbearable heat
from the lifeless forest around me
pulses like a heartbeat.
As I walk beneath the scorched and rotten
to discover my Lover isolated before me
in a world where I am forgotten.
Dolan, my Dearest, effortlessly strides
towards the distraught, roaming soul
and with a saddened lack of pride
he speaks to me calmly and awaits
for the precise explanation as to
“Why have you strayed from our fate?”
Despite the uncomfortable torridity
I manage to utter a sentence or two:
“I do not wish to trouble thee!
You see, for I have no recollection
of where I could possibly envision,
for us, the proper direction.”
My guide then willfully took my hand
leading me to a massive, clear sphere in which
controls the eternity of the ******
Dec 17, 2016
Dec 17, 2016 at 10:01 PM UTC
Over the many years which have passed, my mind constantly brings me back to one place
Where the strong waves crash against the heavy rocks
So powerful, whitecaps form on the waters surface
Could easily knock a grown man off his feet.
But I am secure on shore, dry and content
Blindly in love
For you are beside me where I've always envisioned you
Hand firmly wrapped, untwined with my fingers
You told me I have no reason to fear.
We sit here for a long time, in silence
Connected by our hands, our bodies lost in an unspoken moment with Mother Nature
The wind confirms it's affair with the trees, deep gusts of air blow through rustling up a wonderful sound
I become cold, involuntarily shiver.
Your arm wraps around me, and I shiver again
Just not because of the wind this time
Drawing me closer, I am with you
The birds, the lake
This is all for us
I never want to leave
Transfixed in a dimension furthest from our own
My eyes grow heavy, and I am afraid if we leave here now that things might change
I'm always weary and afraid of the unknown
You pull me to my feet and kiss me so strongly
Breaking apart you say the first spoken words in hours
"I don't know where you came from, but I am so glad you're mine".
The wind carried those words away from us
High above, under the winds of sea birds.
Across the lake, whispering
Across time.
As I sit here, in my
Cobweb covered rocking chair, miles and miles from that spot
I could've sworn I heard your voice carried with that last gust of wind
As it blew through my hair
"I don't know where you came from, but I am so glad you're mine"
Sleep overcame me,
And I dreamed.
Aug 5, 2015
Aug 5, 2015 at 3:32 PM UTC
The fatter rains are beneath the canopy, but deafened
Come the flowers whom I’d sing mournful songs,
Our latter-day hymns of Benjamin Gibberd
So, I say to them all as they to the earth, twinges of falsehood
In loved embraces to the earth they bind themselves
(But the quiet soothes of incurable ills).
Their voices become intolerable candors of intolerable people
That echo between the ash and locust who seem to melt darker.
This empty way comes in sudden inspiration, a heart
Ready to fill with blood again, to beat love and passion
Into nature’s core and I stand in its middle, crushed
By endless gallons of living things; but, I need not surprise
Or overwork myself since the airs taken for granted
That I put on or breath, settle in my lungs
Pressing heavy with every love that could have been
Or every natal anxiety come to plume.
As flies, I am not ready to make vines spring or reek up the woods
And my feet take the flight, take the prayer—I’ve only ever
Prayed to myself, anyway—this tilled earth of my hand,
What will come of me someday, grows out moss
In fibres of a self-conceit remaining in sorrow and censure
Youth and in pleasure, run until my foot gives way in the mud.
I lay sinking at the rude audience of tongues and tangles
And the open world, far too distant to really hear the speeches
They’ve heard far too many times. Perhaps I’ve saddened them
They do not respond to the resigned gurgle of the mud
But, there are tears in the woods, too marked up like pistils
Of much-quitted innocence given no reason to act
No comfort are they, nor am I to them
The only true comfort now, is the weight of the world
And the wind on my back.
Jun 5, 2015
Jun 5, 2015 at 1:17 PM UTC
“For God’s sake, let us sit upon the ground
And tell sad stories of the death of Kings.”
The smell of fresh grasses lefts stifled underfoot,
A thousand tiny voices, wheaten, bug, or no,
Can call up to the elderly trees, whose white palms
Gave surrender only moments ago to this wandering eye.
To think, I am but that hole of many in a chain
Of lattices made only by their breakage,
For I relinquish myself to the spirit or biology
Two gods my life’s work has been to destroy.
The sun comes through that shattered mat of life
A fallen crest, defining the morose bedding of
Victim and trap, so that I may hear it speaking;
Strung up and dragging on its gaunt, breathless rot
It claims a stupid animal lived in this body once,
Relinquished itself by flight to the unwavering, silky
Thread of beautiful frailness, or motionless spectra,
Thus, it deserves to lose what it did not want
Since it did not flee life, it did not flee death.
I wanted to study it more, enchanted by the hollowness
Until water came onto my brow, fell onto my passive lips
Uttering, till then, a prayer to fly from here,
Till my eyes color over and I’ve finally escaped.
But, this motif, I see, is overplayed, too trite
For secular gods who prefer the wiles of game
We, the peak of human life, I the most sufferable of them
I, the most thirsting of my image, tend to consume.
If it were boredom, then plagues would sweep hot winds
Everywhere; thus, it is not, it is the constant reminder,
We are but nothing, but flesh to die, unwitting flies
To the spider’s web.
Jun 5, 2015
Jun 5, 2015 at 1:17 PM UTC
I may tend to the soil.
At 21, growing flowers with my cries for help
Feels criminal, ridiculous. Those ******* children,
On their mute petals flourish jealously
In more lush and verbal company,
But their speak fades out as color and as light
The last of the sounds is celebration and surprise.
Of course, I am tied to this soil, watching waves
And waves of new life rise in clouds of pollen,
Migrating and impatient; New things seem to form,
Divisions where there is only space barring austere tongues
Their desired juices, but I command Myself, abstain,
And keep the teeth and silence like fences
Made of mockery, ridicule, and other forms of self-control.
And yet, the time of false gods effervesces in a comforting dream
When I feign sleep, vines creeping up while I regret their invitation
Standing amongst them, beautifully crafted shapes, lacking color.
I admonish quietly, I suggest furtively, I command passively
And amongst plenty of others, I am one open eye, a slit for lamentations
And they are the doomed recanters of permanence, forever happy
Forever in death, there is no time to wither.
Jun 5, 2015
Jun 5, 2015 at 1:16 PM UTC