Between, when adrift.

SO lie on the broadest hard wooden bench farthest from the door and nearest to the fan. Call for the world you wish to blossom forth in your mind. Today’s would be one of the tragic ones. Drift. On the inside of your eyelids that world does its thing. Pain she feels could have been yours. Almost visceral it is. The humming in your ears would swallow the conversation the others in the class would have been having. So lost in the things etched inside your eyelids you are even the hardness of the bench ceases to discomfit you after a while. Later, only the ache in the scapulae would remind you not to do it again. Hot summer haze in your mind. Degenerating, gnawing away. And when you return half the body will be numb. And the hastily wiped off wetness in the corners of the face will have gone unnoticed. Another book perhaps, or another spell of the same. Perhaps you will go looking for conversation. Call for me next in your somnolence, if you like. I should like to do my thing in the inside of your eyelids too. Sometime.

More laughter today. Some disrobing of minds. The ease of it all, a surprise. The unlikeliness, pleasant.

Last evening I dreamt of the unlikeliest of people. One long dream it was too. The kind one goes back to even after having woken up to wet the throat. There was camaraderie. With utter strangers one has perhaps heard one too many stories about. Runaways and rebels they were in the dream. On the run always. Yearning for home always.

Rebane mi arteria carótida, por favor.

Sadly enough, I can’t make people laugh. Can’t relate stories other people do so glibly. And so am mostly the entertained, rather than the entertainer. Always thought laughter came easily. But even that too has deserted, much like felicity of expression.

But had a series of good laughs to day. Although most of it had to do with people making fun of other people. Accounts of a poet and of a nyaaka man in capris. Twisting meanings. Making meanings. The nyaaka man in capris promptly evinced a discussion about men more feminine than women, with long shapely fingers and perfectly manicured nails and long straight silken hair.

Laughs like today’s always surprise me by their infrequence, though I am only made aware of their infrequence by their occurrence.

Well then, what of it?

He estado llorando mucho desde ayer. Por qué, como siempre, yo no sé. La abuela de un íntimo del mío murió. él es muy triste sobre la cosa entera. él sigue decir, “mi abuela es muerta, mi abuela es muerta…soy triste.” No muestra ninguna emocion. Pero yo sé, él es desconsolado…

Qué no sé, sin embargo, es porqué soy triste.

Poema de la Despedida, Jose A. Buesa

Te digo adiós, y acaso te quiero todavía.
Quizá no he de olvidarte, pero te digo adiós.
No sé si me quisiste… No sé si te quería…
O tal vez nos quisimos demasiado los dos.

Este cariño triste, y apasionado, y loco,
me lo sembré en el alma para quererte a ti.
No sé si te amé mucho… no sé si te amé poco;
pero sí sé que nunca volveré a amar así.

Me queda tu sonrisa dormida en mi recuerdo,
y el corazón me dice que no te olvidaré;
pero, al quedarme solo, sabiendo que te pierdo,
tal vez empiezo a amarte como jamás te amé.

Te digo adiós, y acaso, con esta despedida,
mi más hermoso sueño muere dentro de mí…
Pero te digo adiós, para toda la vida,
aunque toda la vida siga pensando en ti.

Poem of the Farewell

I bid you goodbye, and perhaps I love you still.
Perhaps I have not forgotten you, but I bid you adieu.
I don’t know if you loved me… I don’t know if I wanted you…
Or maybe the two of us loved too much.

This sad, and passionate, and crazy caring
I sowed into my soul so that I could love you.
I don’t know if I loved you a lot… I don’t know if I loved you a little;
but I do know that I will never love this way again.

I am left with your smile asleep in my memory,
and my heart tells me that I will not forget you ;
but, remaining all alone, knowing that I am losing you,
perhaps I begin to love you as I never loved you.

I bid you adieu, and perhaps, with this farewell,
my most beautiful dream dies inside of me…
But I bid you farewell, for all life,
although for all life I will continue thinking of you.

Poema del amor ajeno, Jose A. Buesa

Puedes irte y no importa, pues te quedas conmigo
como queda un perfume donde había una flor.
Tú sabes que te quiero, pero no te lo digo;
y yo sé que eres mía, sin ser mío tu amor.

La vida nos acerca y la vez nos separa,
como el día y la noche en el amanecer…
Mi corazón sediento ansía tu agua clara,
pero es un agua ajena que no debo beber…

Por eso puedes irte, porque, aunque no te sigo,
nunca te vas del todo, como una cicatriz;
y mi alma es como un surco cuando se corta el trigo,
pues al perder la espiga retiene la raíz.

Tú amor es como un río, que parece más hondo,
inexplicablemente, cuando el agua se va.
Y yo estoy en la orilla, pero mirando al fondo,
pues tu amor y la muerte tienen un más allá.

Para un deseo así, toda la vida es poca;
toda la vida es poca para un ensueño así…
Pensando en ti, esta noche, yo besaré otra boca;
y tú estarás con otro… ¡pero pensando en mí!

Jose A. Buesa

Since I couldn’t find a translation….here’s my feeble attempt:

Poem for another’s Love

You may go and it will not matter, since you remain with me
Like there remains a perfume where a flower has been.
You know that I love you, but I don’t say it to you;
And I know that you are mine, without your love being mine.

Life brings us near and Time sunders us apart,
Like Day and Night, at Dawn…
My thirsty heart longs for your clear water,
But it is another’s water which I must not drink…

For this reason you can go, because, although I don’t follow you
Like a scar you never go away entirely;
And my soul is as a furrow when the wheat is cut
And losing the ear it retains the root.

My love for you is like a river, that seems deeper,
Inexplicably, when the water is gone.
And I am at the edge, watching the bottom,
Since your love and death have an afterlife.

For a love like this, all of life is too little
All of life is too little for a dream like this
Thinking about you, tonight, I will kiss another mouth;
and you will be with another … but thinking about me!