Tuesday, January 10, 2006
'Madrigal of Summer'
(If I recall correctly, 'Madrigal of Summer' was the first of Lorca's poems that I attempted to translate.)
Unite your red mouth with mine,
Estrella, my gypsy!
Beneath the gold floor of noonday
I shall bite the apple.
Amongst the green olive trees on the hill
we shall linger in the ruined tower,
and discover whether your peasant flesh
is more the color of honey or of first dawn.
You offer my your sunburnt body,
the divine nourishment
that gives flowers to the quiet riverbed
and day-stars to the wind.
Why do you give yourself to me,
you of the luminous brown skin?
Why give me these perfections of love,
the burnished lily of your sex
and the soft murmur of your breasts?
Not my afflicted figure?
(Oh! My obscene gait!)
Is your great pity, by chance,
for the creaking decay of my life?
Instead of my groans, why not prefer
the sweat-rivered thighs
of a handsome San Christobal peasant,
sluggish in the ways of love?
Murderess of my erect pleasures.
Woman as forest satyr.
This feast of kisses smells of wheat
dried for weeks in the summer sun.
You obscure my vision with your singing.
Let down your long hair,
spread it out like a ceremonial robe,
a shadow upon the meadows.
Paint for me, with your blood colored mouth,
a heaven of love,
in the depths of your flesh, a home
on a star of pain.
My Andalusian pegasus knows the captivation
of your open eyes;
and would fly in silent desolation
were he to see them lifeless.
And though you not love me, I shall love you
for your dusky glances,
as the lark loves the new day
for the dew alone.
Unite your red mouth with mine,
Estrella, my gypsy!
The bright noonday has left us
to consume the apple.
'Sleeping Gypsy Girl', Ferenczy Karoly (1915)
Unite your red mouth with mine,
Estrella, my gypsy!
Beneath the gold floor of noonday
I shall bite the apple.
Amongst the green olive trees on the hill
we shall linger in the ruined tower,
and discover whether your peasant flesh
is more the color of honey or of first dawn.
You offer my your sunburnt body,
the divine nourishment
that gives flowers to the quiet riverbed
and day-stars to the wind.
Why do you give yourself to me,
you of the luminous brown skin?
Why give me these perfections of love,
the burnished lily of your sex
and the soft murmur of your breasts?
Not my afflicted figure?
(Oh! My obscene gait!)
Is your great pity, by chance,
for the creaking decay of my life?
Instead of my groans, why not prefer
the sweat-rivered thighs
of a handsome San Christobal peasant,
sluggish in the ways of love?
Murderess of my erect pleasures.
Woman as forest satyr.
This feast of kisses smells of wheat
dried for weeks in the summer sun.
You obscure my vision with your singing.
Let down your long hair,
spread it out like a ceremonial robe,
a shadow upon the meadows.
Paint for me, with your blood colored mouth,
a heaven of love,
in the depths of your flesh, a home
on a star of pain.
My Andalusian pegasus knows the captivation
of your open eyes;
and would fly in silent desolation
were he to see them lifeless.
And though you not love me, I shall love you
for your dusky glances,
as the lark loves the new day
for the dew alone.
Unite your red mouth with mine,
Estrella, my gypsy!
The bright noonday has left us
to consume the apple.
# posted by Clear Creek Girl : 11:42 AM
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