BROWSE Columns
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La vida dibuja un arbol
y la muerte dibuja otro
La vida dibuja un nido
y la muerte lo copia.
La vida dibuja un pajaro
para que habite el nido
y la muerte de inmediato
dibuja otro pajaro.
Una mano que no dibuja nada
se pasea entre todos los dibujos
y cada tanto cambia uno de sitio.
Por ejemplo:
el pajaro de la vida
ocupa el nida de la muerte
sobre el arbol dibujado por la vida.
Otras veces
la mano que no dibuja nada
borra un dibujo de la serie.
Por ejemplo:
el arbol de la muerte
sostiene el nido de la muerte,
pero no lo ocupa ningun parajo.
Y otras veces
la mano que no dibuja nada
se convierte a si misma
en imagen sobrante,
con figura de pajaro,
con figura de arbol,
con figura de nido.
Y entonces, solo entonces,
no falta ni sobra nada.
Por ejemplo:
dos parajaros
ocupan el nido de la vida
sobre el arbol de la muerte.
O el arbol de la vida
sostiene dos nidos
en los que habita un soilo pajaro.
O un parjaro unico
habita un solo nido
sobre el arbol de la vida
y el arbol de la muerte.
Life draws a tree
and death draws another.
Life draws a nest
and death copies it.
Life draws a bird
to inhabit the nest
and death immediately
draws another bird.
A hand that does not draw anything
walks through all the drawings
and from time to time one changes places.
For example:
the bird of life
occupies the nest of death
on the tree drawn by life.
Other times
the hand that does not draw anything
deletes a drawing from the series.
For example:
the tree of death
holds the nest of death,
but no bird occupies it.
And other times
the hand that does not draw anything
converts itself
into a leftover image,
with a figure of a bird,
with a figure of a tree,
with a figure of a nest.
And then, only then,
nothing is missing or left over.
For example:
two birds
occupy the nest of life
on the tree of death.
Or the tree of life
holds two nests
in which a single bird lives.
Or a unique bird
inhabits a single nest
on the tree of life
and the tree of death.
Un largo tunel se me acerca a la boca
y me baja la voz,
este amillo que no termina nunca de cerrarse.
He buscado en vano una palabra
que sirva como dedo del anillo,
ahora mucho mas cerca.
Si este tunel fuese suficientemente largo,
si retornara cada vez de su extremo,
el mismo seria el dedo.
Solo uando haya dedo se cerrara el anillo.
A long tunnel approaches my mouth
and my voice drops,
this ring that never ends closing.
I have searched in vain for a word
that serves as a ring finger,
now much closer.
If this tunnel were long enough,
if it returned every time from its extreme,
the same would be the finger.
Only when there is a finger will the ring close.
Una mosca anda cabeza abajo por el techo,
un hombre anda cabeza abajo por la calle
y algun dios anda cabeza abajo por la nada.
Tan solo tu no andas esta tarde,
a menos que las ausencias puras
inventen otra forma de andar que no sabemos:
andar cabeza arriba.
Exploraremos el encuentro del amor y la piedra,
el viaje de la mano a su duelo,
la playa de banderas con que suena la sangre,
la fiesta de ser hombre cuando el hombre despierta
y se cae en el hombre,
la fabula que se convierte en nino,
la mujer necessaria para amar lo que amamos
y hasta lo que no amamos.
Y exploraremos tambien el espacio vacio que dejaste en tu poema,
el espacio vacio que dejaste en cada palabra
y hasta en tu propria tumba
para alzar el futuro.
Alli te encontraremos
y juntos echareos a andar cabeza arriba.
(A Paul Éluard)
A fly walks upside down on the ceiling,
a man walks head down along the street
and some god walks head down through nothing.
Only you are not walking this afternoon,
unless pure absences
invent another way of walking that we don't know:
walking head up.
Let's explore the meeting of love and stone,
the journey hand in hand to your grief,
the beach of flags with which the blood rings,
the celebration of being a man when the man wakes up
and falls into becoming a man,
the fable that becomes a child,
the woman necessary to love what we love
and even what we don't love.
And we will also explore the empty space that you left in your poem,
the empty space you left in each word
and even in your own grave
to lift the future.
We will find you there
and together you will start walking head up.
(To Paul Éluard)
En alguna parte hay un hombre
que transpira pensamiento.
Sobre su piel se dibujan
los contornos humedos de una piel mas fina,
la estela de una navegacion sin nave.
Cuando ese hombre piensa luz, ilumina,
cuando piensa muerte, se alisa,
cuando recuerda a alguien, adquiere sus ragos,
cuando cae en si mismo, se oscurece como un pozo.
En el se ve el color de los pensamientos nocturnos
y se aprende que ningun pensamiento carece
de su noche y su dia.
Y tambien que hay colores y pensamientos
que no nacen de dia ni de noche,
sino tan solo cuando crece un poco mad el olvido.
Ese hombre tiene la porosidad de una tierra mas viva
y a veces, cuando suena, toma aspecto de fuego.
salpicaduras de una llama que se alimenta con llama,
retorcimientos de bosque calcinado.
A ese hombre se le puede ver el amor,
pero eso tan solo quien lo encuentre y lo ame.
Y tambien se podria ver en su carne a dios,
pero solo despues de dejar de ver todo el resto.
(A Octavio Paz)
Somewhere there is a man
that sweats thought.
On his skin they are drawn
the moist contours of a thinner skin,
the wake of a navigation without a ship.
When that man thinks light, he is illumined,
when he thinks of death, he smoothes himself out,
when he remembers someone, he takes on their features,
when he falls into himself, he becomes dark like a well.
In him you can see the color of night thoughts
and you learn that no thought is lacking
of his night and his day.
And also that there are colors and thoughts
that are not born during the day or at night,
but only when forgetfulness grows a little more.
That man is porous, an earth that is more alive
and sometimes, when it rings, takes the appearance of fire.
splashes of a flame that is fed with flame,
twists of charred forest.
You can see the love in that man,
but that is only for those who find him and love him.
And you could also see God in his flesh,
but only after you stop seeing everything else.
(To Octavio Paz)
Juarroz was a poet born in Coronel Dorrego, Buenos Aires, Argentina, in 1925. Except for Six Loose Poems (1960), his work is grouped in a series of volumes consecutively numbered from one to fourteen under the general title Vertical Poetry; from 1958 to 1997. His themes focused on metapoetry, and his language became increasingly conceptual as he explored the limits of words as a link between man and the world. His poetry is a kind of collection of dead ends, a constant search.
Wally Swist’s books include Huang Po and the Dimensions of Love (Southern Illinois University Press, 2012), selected by Yusef Komunyakaa for the 2011 Crab Orchard Open Poetry Competition, and A Bird Who Seems to Know Me: Poems Regarding Birds and Nature, winner of the 2018 Ex Ophidia Poetry Prize. Recent essays, poems, and translations have appeared in Asymptote (Taiwan), Chicago Quarterly Review, Commonweal, The Comstock Review, La Piccioletta Barca (U.K.), Pensive: A Journal of Global Spirituality & the Arts, Tipton Poetry Review, Today’s American Catholic, Poetry London, and Your Impossible Voice. Shanti Arts published his translation of L’Allegria, Giuseppe Ungaretti’s first iconic book, in August 2023. He will be featured writer in the Spring 2025 issue of Ezra: An Online Journal of Translation that will highlight several of his translations from the Spanish of Roberto Juarroz. Finishing Line Press will be publishing his book, If You’re the Dreamer, I’m the Dream: Selected Translations from The Book of Hours, in 2025.
