Postal para Elizabeth Bishop
by Carlos Pintadowhere the shadows are really the body
—E.B.
He tenido en un sueño las horas de la noche:
sus altas horas siempre, sus ruinosos silencios,
sus ecos, sus penumbras, sus fatales contornos
he tenido. La noche ha hecho en mí su casa.
He soñado mi cuerpo como una sombra entrando
en otra sombra, cuerpo de mí o de la noche,
como un fuego en tinieblas despacio devorándome.
He soñado mi muerte como un país lejano,
como un anillo de oro hundiéndose en el agua.
Acaso el sueño acerca inevitablemente
al muerto con su muerte, al vivo con su espejo.
Yo he sentido ese horror que ciega y me confunde
con la imagen del otro: una sombra que en mí persiste,
animal de la noche rompiéndose en la noche.
Postcard to Elizabeth Bishop
by Carlos Pintadowhere the shadows are really the body
—E.B.
I’ve been dreaming of the night and all its hours:
its small, late hours, of course, its crumbling silences,
its echoes, and its half-light; its deadly contours,
I’ve dreamed as well. The night has made its home in me.
I’ve dreamed my body like a shadow entering
another shadow, my body or else the night’s,
devouring me slowly like a fire in the dark.
I’ve dreamed my death like some far-off land, like
a golden ring as it sinks into water.
Perhaps the dream will come inexorably close
to dying with its death; to life with its mirror.
And I have known the horror that blinds and bewilders
with the image of the other: a shadow that persists in me,
a creature of the night gone to pieces in the night.
translated from Spanish by Hilary Vaughn Dobel