La Jornada: “Music and poetry were born together and get along well,” says Guillermo Briseño

“The movement is there, it always is,” writes the musician and poet Guillermo Briseño in a verse that, almost like a maxim, outlines his most recent collection of poems, Motion, which was presented at the second edition of the Puebla International Book Fair (Filip).

Conceived as a long poem made up of almost thirty stanzas that are distinguished by their brevity, their musicality and their poetic roundness, the volume of the renowned musician and writer makes music and poetry coexist.

“It is the natural space, a necessity. Each one, music and poetry, has its place; sometimes one has to ask the other for a chance,” defined the musician, who towards the end of 2025 celebrated his 80 years of life and 66 years of musical career at the Esperanza Iris City Theater in Mexico City.

In this volume, he indicated, one also sees the disciplined work that he sometimes adopts, which makes him dedicate time to music and composition, in addition to writing and reading.

“Music and poetry get along well. Furthermore, they allow us to reflect on life, on things, on affections, on tragedies or on loves, or on whatever; it helps, because there are communicating vessels between them, since they were born together, as those in the know say,” he noted.

During an interview after the presentation of the book at the UDLAP Art Chapel, in which he was accompanied by the writers Juan Sebastián Gatti and Jorge Arturo Abascal, Briseño conceived that music and poetry also go hand in hand, which is why sometimes music comes out and other times poetry comes out.

He mentioned that in writing this title, published with the Del Lirio publishing label, he came across a topic that seems to make him reflect for a long time.

“I found inspiration. What is inspiration? Movement produced that in me: I just discovered that warm water is movement, that without movement there is nothing, that movement is god.”

Although he clarified that he does not consider himself a mystic, he is sure that the mystic jumped into his poems contained in this book to tell him that there is not a miracle, but that they are the miracle themselves.

“All the time, the blood, the smile, the tears, the shock, the lump in the throat, everything is movement,” he said enthusiastically.

Therefore, he conceived that at the current moment, and as in the past, poetry continues to be an art that demands to be produced, read, known, used “to live together, to read the other, to feel, to imagine in another way or to accept it.”

“An art that is used for everything and nothing”

The author of many books of poetry, essays and reflections on musical education, stated that poetry is not a dogma or recipe, not even a suggestion, “but the desire to understand the world, to name it in other ways, to try to understand what is written or what is spoken (…), because poetry is useful for everything and nothing.”

When presenting the book, the writer Juan Sebastián Gatti highlighted that in the beginning of humanity it was the word, and the first songs spoke of the journey and the people who moved, so the poem is a body that also moves the same as the reader, whose eyes move when reading and his mind jumps from image to image.

In turn, the author Jorge Arturo Abascal recalled that 25 years ago Briseño’s first book called Verses to drink (and also the glass), On whose guard he dedicated a dedication, which was “the joyful premonition that is confirmed by what we do now: attend and present Guillermo’s most recent poetic publication.”