PUEDO escribir los versos más tristes esta noche.Escribir, por ejemplo: " La noche está estrellada,
y tiritan, azules, los astros, a lo lejos".El viento de la noche gira en el cielo y canta.
Puedo escribir los versos más tristes esta noche.
Yo la quise, y a veces ella también me quiso.En las noches como ésta la tuve entre mis brazos.
La besé tantas veces bajo el cielo infinito.Ella me quiso, a veces yo también la quería.
Cómo no haber amado sus grandes ojos fijos.Puedo escribir los versos más tristes esta noche.
Pensar que no la tengo. Sentir que la he perdido.Oír la noche inmensa, más inmensa sin ella.
Y el verso cae al alma como pasto el rocío.Qué importa que mi amor no pudiera guardarla.
La noche está estrellada y ella no está conmigo.Eso es todo. A lo lejos alguien canta. A lo lejos.
Mi alma no se contenta con haberla perdido.Como para acercarla mi mirada la busca.
Mi corazón la busca, y ella no está conmigo.La misma noche que hace blanquear los mismos árboles.
Nosotros, los de entonces, ya no somos los mismos.Ya no la quiero, es cierto, pero cuánto la quise.
Mi voz buscaba el viento para tocar su oído.De otro. Será de otro. Como antes de mis besos.
Su voz, su cuerpo claro. Sus ojos infinitos.Ya no la quiero, es cierto, pero tal vez la quiero.
Es tan corto el amor, y es tan largo el olvido.Porque en noches como ésta la tuve entre mis brazos,
mi alma no se contenta con haberla perdido.Aunque éste sea el último dolor que ella me causa,
y éstos sean los últimos versos que yo le escribo.I can write the saddest poem of all tonight.
English:
Write, for instance: "The night is full of stars,
and the stars, blue, shiver in the distance."
The night wind whirls in the sky and sings.
I can write the saddest poem of all tonight.
I loved her, and sometimes she loved me too.
On nights like this, I held her in my arms.
I kissed her so many times under the infinite sky.
She loved me, sometimes I loved her.
How could I not have loved her large, still eyes?
I can write the saddest poem of all tonight.
To think I don't have her. To feel that I've lost her.
To hear the immense night, more immense without her.
And the poem falls to the soul as dew to grass.
What does it matter that my love couldn't keep her.
The night is full of stars and she is not with me.
That's all. Far away, someone sings. Far away.
My soul is lost without her.
As if to bring her near, my eyes search for her.
My heart searches for her and she is not with me.
The same night that whitens the same trees.
We, we who were, we are the same no longer.
I no longer love her, true, but how much I loved her.
My voice searched the wind to touch her ear.
Someone else's. She will be someone else's. As she once
belonged to my kisses.
Her voice, her light body. Her infinite eyes.
I no longer love her, true, but perhaps I love her.
Love is so short and oblivion so long.
Because on nights like this I held her in my arms,
my soul is lost without her.
Although this may be the last pain she causes me,
and this may be the last poem I write for her.
Pablo Neruda (1904-1973)
Tuesday, January 26, 2010
Tonight I can write ...
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
It is true, it is a very sad poem but extremely beautiful and touching....
ReplyDeleteThis comment has been removed by the author.
ReplyDelete:)Sean - I decided just to repeat what Borges said, "A fine poet, but a mean man."
ReplyDeleteNevin,
ReplyDeleteI have mixed feelings, too.
Actually, I stumbled upon this video, and decided to post it mainly because voice and presentation of Juan José Torres fascinate(d) me.
Claudia,
interesting you choose to quote Borges to criticise the fervent anti-fascist's Neruda blind Stalin worship.
Do you mean :) that could be why Margaret Thatcher's "dear friend", Augusto Pinochet, in 1976 decided to honour Borges, and ... the fine gentleman poet accepted the medal?
Moreover, Borges afterwards called the dictator "una excelente persona", a man of geniality and kindness, and it's said that this was the reason he did not get the Nobel Prize. And some people would call Borges 'reactionary' since, infected with the ideas of the Nazis.
Conclusion: One can be(come) a gifted artist/writer/poet, and still be an enormous idiot when it comes to politics.
Actually, I thought that maybe Borges could be jealous...He was right but I took what he said with a grain of salt. Possibly he could have judged himself with the same words???
ReplyDeleteAs for who gets the Nobel Prize or not, it's a bit irrelevant. It's so often a political choice. They were very hesitant with this writer because of his devotion to Stalin.
Maybe artists should be silent about their politics. I find it hard to enjoy their works when their philosophy is so obviously wrong. But Pablo also neglected his ailing daughter. It's turning me off more than his twarted philosophy.
You're right. The presentation is outstanding.:)
And I should be silent too!:)))))))
ReplyDeleteIt is a fine poem. I'm not desperately au fait with Borges's political stance. I knew he was conservative. I hope he neither supported neither the murder in Chile or that in his own country,
ReplyDelete