Regresos

by Carlos Pintado

Deambulo por tu sueño y soy

tu propio sueño, dormido.

Bestias de la noche, venid a mí.

Ángeles hermosos, bebed mi sangre.

Yo he sido breve

al cruzar por los espejos,

breve como un golpe de sol

sobre las aguas muertas.

Yo he sido breve.

Largo es el camino

y mis pasos breves.

¿Qué amor me habrá salvado?

¿Qué labio injurió al viento

como si fuera mi nombre

el susurro levísimo de la mies en los campos?

¿Soy yo el que regresa?

Soy yo?

Returning

by Carlos Pintado

I wander through your dream and I

am your own dream, asleep.

Creatures of the night, come to me.

Gorgeous angels, drink my blood.

I have been brief

on crossing through the mirrors,

brief as sun striking

on dead waters.

I have been brief.

Long is the road

and my steps are brief.

What love can save me?

What lip tarnished the wind

as if my name

were the softest whisper of grain in the fields.

Is it I who returns?

Is it I?

translated from Spanish by Hilary Vaughn Dobel

Carlos Pintado is a Cuban-American writer, playwright, and award-winning poet who immigrated to the United States in the early 90s. He received the prestigious 2014 Paz Prize for Poetry for his book, Nueve monedas, awarded by the National Poetry Series and published in a bilingual edition by Akashic Books in New York. His book, Autorretrato en azul, received the Sant Jordi’s International Prize for Poetry, and his El azar y los tesoros was one of the finalists for the Adonais Prize in 2008. He also contributed to The Exile Experience: A Journey to Freedom, coordinated by Cuban-American music producer Emilia Estefan. His poetry has been set to music by Tania Leon and Ileana Perez-Velazquez, and his writing has appeared in Spanish-language Vogue.

Hilary Vaughn Dobel is the translator of Nine Coins by Carlos Pintado (Akashic Books, 2015), winner of the 2014 Octavio Paz Prize, and The Clouds (Open Letter Books, forthcoming). She is also the author of two poetry manuscripts, Hot Cognition (finalist, Brittingham Prize) and He Imagined Himself Laughing (finalist, Colorado Prize for Poetry). She holds an MFA in poetry and literary translation from Columbia University and is the recipient of fellowships from Columbia and the University of Chicago. She lives in Boston and at hilaryvdobel.wordpress.com.