Neruda And Vallejo: Selected Poems Part 46

BLACK STONE LYING ON A WHITE STONE.

I will die in Paris, on a rainy day, on some day I can already remember.

I will die in Paris-and I don't step aside- perhaps on a Thursday, as today is Thursday, in autumn.

It will be a Thursday, because today, Thursday, setting down these lines, I have put my upper arm bones on wrong, and never so much as today have I found myself with all the road ahead of me, alone.

Cesar Vallejo is dead. Everyone beat him, although he never does anything to them ; they beat him hard with a stick and hard also with a rope. These are the witnesses: the Thursdays, and the bones of my arms, the solitude, and the rain, and the roads Translated by Robert Bly

and John Knoepfle

NOMINA DE HUESOS.

Se peda a grandes voces: -Que muestre las dos manos a la vez.

Y esto no fue posible.

-Que, mientras llora, le tomen la medida de sus pasos Y esto no fue posible.

-Que piense un pensamiento identico, en el tiempo que un cero permanece intil.

Y esto no fue posible.

-Que haga una locura.

Y esto no fue posible.

-Que entre el y otro hombre semejante a el, ponga una muchedumbre de hombres como el.

Y esto no fue posible.

-Que le comparen consigo mismo.

Y esto no fue posible.

-Que le llamen, en fin, por su nombre.

Y esto no fue posible.

En el momento en que el tenista lanza magistralmente

su bala, le posee una inocencia totalmente animal ; en el momento en que el filsofo sorprende una nueva verdad, es una bestia completa.

Anatole France afirmaba que el sentimiento religioso es la funcin de un rgano especial del cuerpo humano, hasta ahora ignorado y se podra decir tambien, entonces, que, en el momento exacto en que un tal rgano funciona plenamente tan puro de malicia est el creyente, que se dira casi un vegetal.

Oh alma! Oh pensamiento! Oh Marx! Oh Feuerbach!

THE ROLLCALL OF BONES.

They demanded in loud voices: "We want him to show both hands at the same time."

And that simply couldn't be done.

"We want them to check the length of his steps while he cries."

And that simply couldn't be done.

"We want him to think one identical thought during the time a zero goes on being useless."

And that simply couldn't be done.

"We want him to do something crazy."

And that simply couldn't be done.

"We want a ma.s.s of men like him to stand in between him and another man just like him."

And that simply couldn't be done.

"We want them to compare him with himself."

And that simply couldn't be done.

"We want them to call him finally by his own name."

And that simply couldn't be done.

Translated by Robert Bly

The tennis-player, in the instant he majestically

serves his ball, he has an innocence almost totally animal ; in the instant the philosopher surprises a new truth he's an absolute brute.

Anatole France tells us the religious emotion is secreted by a special organ of the human body, up till now unrecognized, in fact it's possible to declare further that at precisely the moment in which that organ is functioning perfectly the believer is so marvelously wicked as to be almost a vegetable.

Oh soul! Oh thinking! Oh Marx! Oh Feuerbach!

Translated by Robert Bly

Un pilar soportando consuelos,

pilar otro, pilar en duplicado, pilaroso y como nieto de una puerta oscura.

Ruido perdido, el uno, oyendo, al borde del cansancio; bebiendo, el otro, dos a dos, con asas.

Ignoro acaso el ano de este da, el odio de este amor, las tablas de esta frente?

Ignoro que esta tarde cuesta das?

Ignoro que jams se dice "nunca," de rodillas?

Los pilares que v me estn oyendo ; otros pilares son, doses y nietos tristes de mi pierna.

Lo digo en cobre americano, que le bebe a la plata tanto fuego!

Consolado en terceras nupcias, plido, nacido, voy a cerrar mi pila bautismal, esta vidriera, este susto con tetas, este dedo en capilla, corazonmente unido a mi esqueleto.

6 septiembre 1937

One pillar holding up consolations,

another pillar, a pillar in duplicate, a pillar like the grandson of a dark door.

Lost outcries, the one listening at the edge of exhaustion; the other pillar, with handles, drinking, two by two.

Perhaps I don't know this day of the year, the hatred of this love, the slabs of this forehead?

Don't I know that this afternoon will cost days?

Don't I know that one never says "never" on his knees?

The pillars that I looked at are listening to me ; they are other pillars, pairs of them, sad grandsons of my leg.

I say it in American copper: that drinks so much fire from the silver!

Consoled by third marriages, pale, just born, I am going to lock my baptismal font, this gla.s.s showcase, this fear that has b.r.e.a.s.t.s, this fingertip with the hood on, in my heart united with my skeleton.

Translated by James Wright

Y no me digan nada,