![BEATRICE](http://www.beatrice.com/b2/beat2logo.jpg)
![RSS button](http://www.beatrice.com/rss-button.png)
introducing readers to writers since 1995
April 15, 2004
"A labyrinth of narrow streets," Antonio Machado
by Ron HoganA labyrinth of narrow streets
converges on the desrted plaza.
On one side the old big wall in shadow
of a church in ruin;
on the other the whitish adobe wall
of an orchard with cypresses and palms,
and before me the house,
and on the house the iron grille
outside the window that light blurs
her placid and smiling face.
I will go away. I don't want
to call at your window... Spring
comes, her white dresss
floats in the wind of the dead plaza.
She comes to burn the red
roses of your bushes... I want to see her...
From Border of a Dream: Selected Poems, translated by Willis Barnstone.
For another example of Barnstone's rendition of Machado, try "Summer Night." Or this batch which appeared in The Drunken Boat.
Here's a translation of "The wind, one brilliant day" by Robert Bly, who also translated "People Possess Four Things." Read Bly's translation of the first stanza of "Portrait":
My childhood is memories of a patio in Seville,
and a garden where sunlit lemons are growing yellow;
my youth twenty years on the earth of Castile;
what I lived a few things you'll forgive me for omitting.
Compare to Barnstone:
My childhood is memories of a patio in Sevilla
and a shining orchard where the lemon tree ripens.
My youth, twenty years on the earth of Castilla,
my life, a few events that I prefer forgotten.
your PayPal donation
can contribute towards its ongoing publication.