What Is Found There

I want to sleep the dream of the apples,
to withdraw from the tumult of cemetries.
I want to sleep the dream of that child
who wanted to cut his heart on the high seas.

I don’t want to hear again that the dead do not lose their blood,
that the putrid mouth goes on asking for water.
I don’t want to learn of the tortures of the grass,
nor of the moon with a serpent’s mouth
that labors before dawn.

I want to sleep awhile, awhile,
a minute, a century;
but all must know that I have not died;
that there is a stable of gold in my lips;
that I am the small friend of the West wind;
that I am the immense shadow of my tears.

Cover me at dawn with a veil,
because dawn will throw fistfuls of ants at me,
and wet with hard water my shoes
so that the pincers of the scorpion slide.

For I want to sleep the dream of the apples,
to learn a lament that will cleanse me of the earth;
for I want to live with that dark child
who wanted to cut his heart on the high seas.

No quiero que me repitan que los muertos no pierden la sangre;
que la boca podrida sigue pidiendo agua.
No quiero enterarme de los martirios que da la hierba,
ni de la luna con boca de serpiente
que trabaja antes del amanecer.

Quiero dormir un rato,
un rato, un minuto, un siglo;
pero que todos sepan que no he muerto;
que hay un establo de oro en mis labios;
que soy el pequeño amigo del viento Oeste;
que soy la sombra inmensa de mis lágrimas.

Cúbreme por la aurora con un velo,
porque me arrojará puñados de hormigas,
y moja con agua dura mis zapatos
para que resbale la pinza de su alacrán.

Porque quiero dormir el sueño de las manzanas
para aprender un llanto que me limpie de tierra;
porque quiero vivir con aquel niño oscuro
que quería cortarse el corazón en alta mar.

Selected Poems of Federico García Lorca (1955), p. 165
Translation by Stephen Spender and J. L. Gili
steerforth.wordpress.com/2007/04/01/gacela-of-dark-death/

Federico García Lorca

The New York dawn has
four columns of filth
and a hurricane of black pigeons
that paddle in the putrid waters.

The New York dawn grieves
along the immense stairways,
seeking amidst the sharp edges
spice-plants of fine-drawn anguish.

The dawn comes and no one receives it in his mouth,
for no morning or hope is possible there.
Now and then mad swarms of nickels and dimes
puncture and devour abandoned children.

The first to come out understand in their bones
that there will be no paradise nor loves stripped of leaves:
they know they are going to the filth of figures and laws,
to artless games, to fruitless sweat.

The light is buried under chains and noises
in the ugly threat of rootless science.
Through the suburbs sleepless people stagger,
as though just delivered from a shipwreck of blood.

La aurora de Nueva York gime
por las inmensas escaleras
buscando entre las aristas
nardos de angustia dibujada.

La aurora llega y nadie la recibe en su boca
porque allí no hay mañana ni esperanza posible.
A veces las monedas en enjambres furiosos
taladran y devoran abandonados niños.

Los primeros que salen comprenden con sus huesos
que no habrá paraísos ni amores deshojados;
saben que van al cieno de números y leyes,
a los juegos sin arte, a sudores sin fruto.

La luz es sepultada por cadenas y ruidos
en impúdico reto de ciencia sin raíces.
Por los barrios hay gentes que vacilan insomnes
como recién salidas de un naufragio de sangre.

The Selected Poems of Federico García Lorca (1955), p. 122
Based on translations by Robert Bly, and Stephen Spender/J. L. Gili
www.poetryfoundation.org/poem/180659

Federico García Lorca

If only you would touch my heart,

if only you were to put your mouth to my heart,

your delicate mouth, your teeth,

if you were to put your tongue like a red arrow

there where my dusty heart is heating,

if you were to blow on my heart near the sea, weeping,

it would make a dark noise, like the drowsy sound of

train wheels,

like the indecision of waters,

like autumn in full leaf,

like blood,

with a noise of damp flames burning the sky,

with a sound like dreams or branches or the rain,

or foghorns in some dismal port,

if you were to blow on my heart near the sea,

like a white ghost,

in th spume of the wave,

in the middle of the wind,

like a ghost unleashed, at the seashore, weeping.

Like a long absence, like a sudden hell,

the sea doles out the sound of the heart,

raining, darkening at sundown, on a lonely coast:

no question that night falls

and its mournful blue of the flags of shipwrecks

peoples itself with planets of throaty silver. Read more…

Pablo Neruda, Robert Hass

It so happens I am sick of being a man.
And it happens that I walk into tailorshops and movie houses
dried up, waterproof, like a swan made of felt
steering my way in a water of wombs and ashes.

The smell of barbershops makes me break into hoarse sobs.
The only thing I want is to lie still like stones or wool.
The only thing I want is to see no more stores, no gardens,
no more goods, no spectacles, no elevators.

It so happens that I am sick of my feet and my nails
and my hair and my shadow.
It so happens I am sick of being a man.

Still it would be marvelous
to terrify a law clerk with a cut lily,
or kill a nun with a blow on the ear.
It would be great
to go through the streets with a green knife
letting out yells until I died of the cold.

I don’t want to go on being a root in the dark,
insecure, stretched out, shivering with sleep,
going on down, into the moist guts of the earth,
taking in and thinking, eating every day. Read more…

Pablo Neruda

Secret memories
not on the road
of our other memories!

Memories, that one night,
suddenly, come alive,
like a rose in the desert,
like a star at noon
—the stronger burning in this cold nothingness—
landmarks of the best
life a man has,
which is hardly lived at all!

Path dry
day after day;
then the miracle, suddenly,
an amazing springtime,
memories returned from the past!

Read more…

Juan Ramón Jiménez

The New York dawn has
four columns of filth
and a hurricane of black doves
that putter in the putrid waters.

The New York dawn groans
up the immense stairways,
searching along the sharp edges
for spice-plants of fine-drawn anguish.

The dawn comes and no one receives it in his mouth,
for there neither tomorrow nor hope is possible.
Only now and then mad swarms of furious coins
sting and devour the abandoned children.

The first to leave their houses know in their bones
there’ll be no paradise nor amours stripped of leaves:
they know they are going to the filth of figures and laws,
to artless games, to fruitless work.

The light is buried under chains and noises
in the ugly threat of rootless science.
Through the suburbs people stagger without sleep,
as though recently rescued from a shipwreck of blood.

Read more…

Federico García Lorca

Mara Mori brought me
a pair of socks
which she knitted herself
with her sheepherder’s hands,
two socks as soft as rabbits.
I slipped my feet into them
as if they were two cases
knitted with threads of twilight and goatskin,
Violent socks,
my feet were two fish made of wool,
two long sharks
sea blue, shot through
by one golden thread,
two immense blackbirds,
two cannons,
my feet were honored in this way
by these heavenly socks.
They were so handsome for the first time
my feet seemed to me unacceptable
like two decrepit firemen,
firemen unworthy of that woven fire,
of those glowing socks.
Read more…

Pablo Neruda