It means "to teem" or "to swarm". The verb comes from the word formiga ("ant" 🐜), and it evokes the constant busy movement of ants, up and down all day without stop.
The poet Jacint Verdaguer used this verb in this verse from his poem Plus Ultra:
L’univers és infinit,
pertot acaba i comença,
i ençà, enllà, amunt i avall,
la immensitat és oberta,
I a on tu veus lo desert
eixams de mons formiguegen.
Here I attempt to translate it to English:
The universe is infinite,
it ends and starts everywhere,
and since, further up there, up and down,
the immensity is open,
And there where you see the desert,
swarms of worlds teem.
Verdaguer was a master in creating this mental images. In this case, I love how these two lines ("and there where you see the desert / swarms of worlds teem") because the verb is very descriptive of this view, that seems still and quiet to us, but if we were to take a close look, we would see thousands in constant movement, at a minuscule scale maybe, but with no stop.
Find the full poem + English translation under the cut.
Plus Ultra by Jacint Verdaguer.
Original poem in Catalan:
estello, fai-te clara,
car cerque moun camin.
Allà dellà de l’espai
he vist somriure una estrella
perduda en lo front del cel
com espiga en temps de sega,
com al pregon de l’afrau
una efímera lluerna.
-Estrelleta –jo li he dit-,
de la mar cerúlia gemma,
de les flors de l’alt verger [heaven]
series tu la darrera?
-No só la darrera, no;
no só més que una llanterna
de la porta del jardí
que creies tu la frontera.
És sols lo començament
lo que prenies per terme.
L’univers és infinit,
pertot acaba i comença,
i ençà, enllà, amunt i avall,
la immensitat és oberta,
I a on tu veus lo desert
eixams de mons formiguegen.
Dels camins de l’infinit
són los mons la polsinera
que puja i baixa a sos peus
quan Jehovà s’hi passeja.
English:
star, shine bright
for I am searching for my path.
Up there, on the other side of space
I have seen a star smile
lost in the sky's front
like a wheat spike in reaping time,
like the depths of a canyon
an ephemeral torch.
"Little star" I have told her,
"out of the sea's cerulean gems,
out of the flowers of the tall lush [=Heaven]
would you be the last one?"
"I am not the last one, no;
I am nothing more than the lantern
at the garden's gate
that you believed to be the border.
What you took for an end,
is only the beginning.
The universe is infinite,
it ends and starts everywhere,
and since, further up there, up and down,
the immensity is open,
And there where you see the desert
swarms of worlds teem.
The worlds are the dust
of the infinity's paths
that are moved up and down at his feet
when Jehovah [God] takes a walk in them.
Jacint Verdaguer is one of the most beloved Catalan poets of all times. He lived in the 19th century and was very involved in the Catalan revival movement, defending Catalan folk culture and language. He was also deeply religious and became a Catholic priest since an early age.
The poem Plus Ultra was published after Verdaguer's death in 1903.
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