READIN

Sunday, October 6th, 2013

🦋 Soñando caminos: We change the language by what we say.

(with thanks to Leilani for the lovely restatement of Machado's theme)

Wanderer, these your steps
make up the path, and nothing more;
wanderer, there is no path:
you make the path by walking.
By walking you make the path,
and turning back your gaze you see
the trail you'll tread upon no more.
Wanderer, there is no path:
just wake upon the sea.

— Antonio Machado: Proverbs and poems â…©â…©â…¨

I've had this poem on my mind quite a bit recently. I thought I would spend a little time writing about it — I'd like to examine its face-value meaning, the metaphor of the poem, and the value of the metaphor, how it speaks to me; and incidentally I'd like to put a little effort into defending my translation, which is fairly different from the standard translation of Betty Jean Craige, in Selected Poems of Antonio Machado, 1979. I think (obviously I think) it is an improvement on Craige's translation; it seems worthwhile to elaborate on why I think that way — how my translation speaks more clearly than Craige's. But that should be a secondary point really; what I really want to talk about is how it is that I find this poem to speak to me so clearly. It is nice as well to get a chance to quote a couple of poems that I've translated and written over the past few years. I think it will make worthwhile reading, see what you think.

Let's reread Machado's first lines. Your steps make up the path, and nothing more. (The "path" dang it, not the road — roads are engineered and built by crews of men over the years, not "made by walking". And a wanderer is hardly confined to the roadways.) A path is a most personal thing. And what Machado's metaphor here is, is the path of one's life: it's not mapped out before one but made up of one's footsteps, the trail one leaves through life. Which one will tread upon no more. The obvious question here to ask is, "But isn't that pretty obviously true?" and yes, of course it is, and has been pointed out before; but an obvious truth that seems perennially to need restatement — one that comes to me at least as a revelation every time I hear it expressed, and doubly so when it is expressed so elegantly as Machado puts it here.

I came to this poem pretty early in life. I can't remember what group it was but I seem to recall its having had an anthemic quality in some vaguely lefty/artistic circles I had some contact with in my teen years — possibly I remember it from Peace Camp, though in what context is not quite clear.* It has an elemental feel to it, something so clearly correct and valuable that it is hard to know where to begin. (And this quality is, obviously, so strong that it shines through a slight roughness of rendering like Craige's, which is the poem I remember from my youth. It was not until I was talking about it with a friend last year and he brought up the objection vis-a-vis roads that I realized a better translation was needed.) I heard it again recently in Oaxaca, a man played guitar and sang it prior to a poetry reading.

Machado's clarity of voice as he addresses you, asks you to reexamine the ground you're walking on, gives you the reader a new point of perspective. Likewise another restatement of this metaphor, this obvious truth — poems of a slightly different form but closely related theme are a few of Pablo Antonio Cuadras's about el maestro de Tarca. The first and eighth poems in his series both feature el maestro sitting up on la Piedra del Águila, telling his disciples what is fitting and just. The maestro's seafarer plays much the same role here as the wanderer (in the desert?) of Machado.

One thing I love about Machado's treatment of this universal truth is how easily it can be parodied, and how the parodies can ring clear, can bring out new shades of meaning in the original. What at first seems paradoxical can with a slight twist of the lenses be made to appear blindingly, obviously the case. Take for instance Leilani Hagberg's line in the title of this piece, or my expansion on it:

For language (while it is of course a facility created over hundreds (or tens?) of thousands of years by all of humanity in concert) has as highly personal a quality to it when considered in the particular case as does one's path. A sillier (and a fun, and rewarding, to be sure) parody, and one that indeed suffers from the same symptom of misunderstanding as does Craige's version, is:

Let's look at another fragment of Machado's concerned with paths and wanderers; this one from "I keep dreaming of pathways":

Not quite sure how to bring out what it is that I find so compelling about the central metaphor these pieces all have in common, why it rings so clear to me and (I hope) to the reader. (—Not to take any unwanted liberties.)

* Also Ellen reminds me to mention Myles Horton and Paolo Freire's book We Make the Road by Walking: Conversations on Education and Social Change (1990).

posted morning of October 6th, 2013: 3 responses
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Saturday, August 17th, 2013

🦋 Metamorphoses

Wow, there is some great poetry in this issue of Metamorphoses. Akhmatova, Tsvetaeva, Hilst, Orhan Veli, Benny Andersen (whose "Kierkegaard on a bicycle" is going to be my new favorite poem for at least a little while),...

posted afternoon of August 17th, 2013: Respond
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Sunday, August 4th, 2013

🦋 Otras figuras bogotanas

The sound of things falling is a book about Bogotá, and poetry is a huge part of that city's history. A part I don't know much about at all... Looks like I am going to be learning a bit as I make my way through the book. Early in the second chapter we find a reference to León de Greiff, Antonio quotes from his "Admonición a los impertenentes" as he says he doesn't want his family visiting him.

Yo deseo estar solo. Non curo de compaña.
Quiero catar silencio. Non me peta mormurio
ninguno a la mi vera. Si la voz soterraña
de la canción adviene, que advenga con sordina:
si es la canción ruidosa, con mi mudez la injurio;
si tráe mucha música, que en el Hades se taña
o en cualquiera región al negro Hades vecina...
Ruido: ¡Callad! Pregón de aciago augurio!
Yo deseo estar solo. Non curo de compaña.
Quiero catar silencio, mi sóla golosina.

Como yo soy el Solitario,
como yo soy el Taciturno,
dejádme solo.

Before dying Caldas wrote on the wall a large Greek letter θ, which has been interpreted as exclaiming "Oh larga y negra partida!"
(See Crónicas de Bogotá Segunda Edición Tomo III, Pedro M. Ibáñez)

posted afternoon of August 4th, 2013: 1 response
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🦋 Nocturno

The tape Antonio listens to in the Casa de Poesía while Laverde is listening to his message, is a reading of one of José Asunción Silva's Nocturnes.

Una noche
Una noche toda llena de perfumes, de murmullos y de músicas de alas,

Una noche
En que ardían en la sombra nupcial y húmeda las luciérnagas fantásticas,
A mi lado lentamente, contra mí ceñida, toda,

Muda y pálida
Como si un presentimiento de amarguras infinitas,
Hasta el más secreto fondo de las fibras te agitara,
Por la senda florecida que atraviesa la llanura florecida

Caminabas,

Y la luna llena
Por los cielos azulosos, infinitos y profundos esparcía su luz blanca,

Y tu sombra

Fina y lánguida,

Y mi sombra
Por los rayos de la luna proyectada
Sobre las arenas tristes
De la senda se juntaban

Y eran una

Y eran una
Y eran una sola sombra larga!
Y eran una sola sombra larga!
Y eran una sola sombra larga!

Esta noche

Solo, el alma
Llena de las infinitas amarguras y agonías de tu muerte,
Separado de ti misma, por la sombra, por el tiempo y la distancia,

Por el infinito negro

Donde nuestra voz no alcanza,

Solo y mudo

Por la senda caminaba,
Y se oían los ladridos de los perros a la luna,

A la luna pálida,

Y el chillido

De las ranas,
Sentí frío, era el frío que tenían en la alcoba
Tus mejillas y tus sienes y tus manos adoradas,

Entre las blancuras níveas

De las mortüorias sábanas!
Era el frío del sepulcro, era el frío de la muerte

Era el frío de la nada...

Y mi sombra
Por los rayos de la luna proyectada,

Iba sola,

Iba sola

¡Iba sola por la estepa solitaria!

Y tu sombra esbelta y ágil

Fina y lánguida,
Como en esa noche tibia de la muerta primavera,
Como en esa noche llena de murmullos de perfumes y de músicas de alas,

Se acercó y marchó con ella

Se acercó y marchó con ella,
Se acercó y marchó con ella... ¡Oh las sombras enlazadas!
¡Oh las sombras que se buscan en las noches de negruras y de lágrimas!...

posted morning of August 4th, 2013: Respond
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Sunday, January 20th, 2013

🦋 Otra vez «Prufrock»

caminamos tú y yo
se anochece en el cielo
como un borracho en el arroyo
visitamos calles desiertos
esquinas quejumbrosas
y otras calles las que sigamos
y que formen argumento
cada vez mas aparente
hacia un propósito muy obvio
lo que sin embargo no podemos llamar
por cualquier nombre
o palabra

pero vengamos, no discutamos.

posted afternoon of January 20th, 2013: 2 responses
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Saturday, January 12th, 2013

🦋 Prufrock in Manhattan

On these pages I record and bequeath
the semi-autobiographical log,
a sort of last will and testament,
perhaps devoid of the Maestro’s
meter, rhythm and rhyme,
a run-away musical score
for a fugue in counterpoint

-- Fugue in Counterpoint with Prufrock

Nice Prufrock passage at cleek's.

posted afternoon of January 12th, 2013: Respond
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Wednesday, January 9th, 2013

🦋 Two takes on Prufrock

caminamos tú y yo
se anochece en el cielo
como un borracho en el arroyo:
visitamos unos esquinas
y calles ya desconocidas
platicamos, sonreímos
me resulta muy difícil olvidar

-- The Modesto Kid

Let us go then, you and I,
the evening sprawled across the sky
just like a drunkard, passed out in the gutter.
The patrons scowl, and mutter.

-- Peter Conlay

posted morning of January 9th, 2013: 1 response
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Wednesday, November 28th, 2012

🦋 A couple of things about Joaquín Pasos

• I spent a few weeks in October working on a translation of his "Canto de guerra de las cosas" that I had started and abandoned a couple of years ago. What a great poem this is!
• Searching for more about him led me to find some of Chris Brandt's translations -- I was particularly floored by his version of "Hotel Tremol", which you can hear John John reading on YouTube.
• From Brandt's translations I was inspired to buy Pasos' Poesía completa, which is available in a very nice edition being remaindered at Amazon.es -- with shipping included it is ~$12. (You should buy it if you read Spanish.)
• I'm just blown away by the poems -- it is premature to talk about favorites at this point but already with the very second poem in the book, "Cook «Voyages»," we are among the very highest ranks of poetic imagery.
• Three of Pasos' books are called Poemas de un joven que no ha viajado nunca, Poemas de un joven que no ha amado nunca, and Poemas de un joven que no sabe inglés. This last one, "Poems by a kid who doesn't know English," is not in the collected edition I got but you can read it online at The University of Utah's site. "Hotel Tremol" and "Voyages" are both in the first one, "Poems by a kid who has never travelled." They are together quite enough to put Pasos among the best poets I've read.

posted evening of November 28th, 2012: Respond

Sunday, July 15th, 2012

🦋 We change the language by what we say.

Caminante, son tus huellas
el camino, y nada más;
caminante, no hay camino,
se hace camino al andar.
Al andar se hace camino,
y al volver la vista atrás
se ve la senda que nunca
se ha de volver a pisar.
Caminante, no hay camino,
sino estelas en la mar.

Wanderer, these your steps
Make up the path, and nothing more;
Wanderer, there is no path:
You make the path by walking.
By walking you make the path,
And turning back your gaze you see
The wilderness you'll never cross again.
Wanderer, there is no path:
Just wake upon the sea.

Antonio Machado:
"Proverbios y cantares" #29

posted afternoon of July 15th, 2012: 4 responses
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Wednesday, June 6th, 2012

Check out this passage from Serrano's Antigua vida mía -- it gives the pleasure of switching back between Spanish and English, back and forth between narrator's voice and poet's, several times over.

La página era «Poem of Women», de Adrienne Rich. Ay, Violeta, no fue mi deseo afanarme en el desencuentro. No, créeme que no elegí ser esa testigo desatenta de lo que te estaba pasando.

Puedo reproducir lo subrayado, me lo sé de memoria:

And all the limbs of a woman plead for the ache of birth.
And women come down to lie like sick sheep
by the wells – to heal their bodies,
their faces blackened with year-long thirst for a child’s cry
(...)
and pregnant women approach the white tables of
the hospital with quiet steps
and smile at the unborn child
and perhaps at death*.

Violeta, dime que tu sonrisa fue para el niño no­naci­do, pero no me lo digas si fue para la muerte.

---

* Y el cuerpo entero de la mujer suplica por el dolor del parto. / Y entonces bajan ellas, las mujeres, cual ovejas heridas, / buscando la sanación de sus cuerpos –junto a los pozos–, / sus rostros ensombrecidos por la larga y sedienta espera del llanto de un recién nacido. / (...) y las mujeres encinta se acercan a las blancas camillas del hospital / con pasos silenciosos / y le sonríen al niño aún no nacido / y le sonríen, acaso, a la muerte.

...And very strange, Google is not showing me any reference to this poem which is not quoting it from this book -- is this a real poem by non-fictional Adrienne Rich, or a part of the fiction?

posted evening of June 6th, 2012: Respond

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