Amor Pretao
Vicente Garcia Lyrics

Pocas veces en mi pecho
He sentido el mundo entero
Ver gaviotas que en el cielo
Van cantando a pleno vuelo

Vicente Garcia's song Amor Pretao starts with a simple count in, "Un, dos, tres, cuatro", leading us into a poetic and emotive expression of the hardships of love. The opening lines talk about the pervasiveness of the emotions we feel in love, which can engulf us entirely. The metaphorical use of the seagulls in flight highlights the feeling of vastness and freedom that love can bring. However, in the very next lines, the artist describes how his feelings of hope and romance often go unfulfilled, and he ends up hiding them away in his own heart. The line, “Casi siempre me termino conformando el corazón” (“I almost always end up molding my heart”) reflects the struggle and emotional exhaustion of trying to maintain romantic hope in the face of disappointment.

The refrain, “Amor pretao” is a colloquial term in the Dominican Republic to signify love that is not returned, essentially unrequited love. The repetition emphasizes the hardship and the gut-wrenching feeling of unrequited love, further reinforced by the lines, “Tantas veces desde el cielo, me desploman, hasta el suelo , sin anhelo, sin consuelo” (“So many times from above they drop me to the ground, without hope, without comfort”). The song climaxes with the image of a shipwrecked sailor left stranded by the sea, a metaphor for being saved from love but having nothing to hold onto, nothing to keep him afloat in the vast expanse of his hopelessness.

Overall, the song is a poetic and haunting exploration of the perils of love and the heart's resilience in the face of heartbreak. It speaks to a universal human experience that transcends cultural and linguistic barriers.