Indigenous poiesis: the semiotics of circulation in Villegas' Maya Poetry

This chapter explores a bilingual poem written in Spanish and the indigenous Yucatec Maya language of southeast Mexico. Composed by Maya poet Wildernain Villegas, it is entitled “Kukuláankil” in Yucatec and “Pulso” in Spanish, which both translate as “pulse” or “pulsation”. I argue that Villegas’ poem evinces a Maya philosophy whereby poetics emerges from a larger category of poiesis, or creative potential, as a fundamental property of nature. The chapter seeks to create a dialogue between “Western” theoretical perspectives from philosophy, biology and anthropology, on the one hand, and Maya cultural concepts such as kukuláankil (pulsation) and tsikbaal (conversation), on the other hand. This dialogue informs the close reading that occupies most of the chapter and which compares the Maya and Spanish versions at linguistic, literary and anthropological levels. This transcultural, translinguistic and transdisciplinary conversation positions itself, like Villegas’ poem, as emergent from wider poietic processes, departing from a basis of resonance and empathy rather than detached objectivity.