RIVERSIDE DRIVE Jos Emilio Pacheco He plays with his little friend in Riverside Drive.

(Bombs have fallen and the war has ended.) An afternoon, finally, he is invited to the house. Both are five or six years old. They know nothing about history or geopolitics. The mom serves him the best sandwich that he has ever had in his life. The dad tries not to be outdone in friendliness: I know your country. I spent a night in Tijuana. These are the words I know in your language: whore, thief, help, I ve been robbed. (La Arena Errante, 1999) Translated by Eduardo Santana It is Useless to Turn Around Alain Derbez As you read this someone else like you approaches your exposed back. Don t move, don t. It is useless to turn around spreading yourself liquid shadow to the wall to see how that one faces you to feel how that one reads you as you read this. Translated by Eduardo Santana, 07/16/2012 Intil es volverte Alain Derbez Mientras lees esto otro como t se aproxima a la espalda descubierta. No te muevas, no. Intil es volverte, untarte sombra lquida en el muro mirar como te mira frente a frente sentir como te lee mientras lees esto. Eduardo Santana Trip Salvador Novo Prickly pears stick out their tongues at us but cornfields lined up by height with their awkwardly cut bangs and their little notebooks under their arm say hi to us with their frayed sleeves.

The magueys perform Swedish Gymnastics in rows five hundred deep and the sun secret cop (throws the stone and hides its hands) denounces our ridiculous escape in the magic lantern of the grass. By night we ll have our revenge lightening up our lamps and bringing down the forests. Some of the trees want to lecture on philology. Clouds, inspectors of monuments shake the scale models of the hills. Who wants to play tennis with the prickly pears and their fruits over the net of the telegraphs? Later we will take a Russian bath, in a lost shack in the mountain ranges We ll only need a rainbow shower we ll dry with a stratus From "Twenty poems" 1925 Translated by Eduardo Santana, July 16, 2012 Viaje Salvador Novo Los nopales nos sacan la lengua pero los maizales por estaturas con su copetito mal rapado y su cuaderno debajo del brazo nos saludan con sus mangas rotas. Los magueyes hacen gimnasia sueca de quinientos en fondo y el sol -polica secreto(tira la piedra y esconde la mano) denuncia nuestra fuga ridcula en la linterna mgica del prado. A la noche nos vengaremos encendiendo nuestros faroles y echando por tierra los bosques. Alguno que otro rbol quiere dar clase de filologa. Las nubes inspectoras de monumentos sacuden las maquetas de los montes. Quin quiere jugar tenis con nopales y tunas sobre la red de los telgrafos? Tomaremos ms tarde un bao ruso, en el jacal perdido de la sierra nos bastar un duchazo de arco iris nos secaremos con algn stratus. De "Veinte poemas" 1925

Booz watches Ruth sleep Gilberto Owen (1904 1952) The island is surrounded by a trembling sea that some call skin. But it is foam. It is a sea extending its whiteness to the sky like the halo of the Tehuanas and saints. It is a sea that always is in trance of first communion. Being able to inhabit your truthful fire surrounded everywhere by lilies, being able to enter into your closed ports blue and round like blue eyes capturing all the day s sun, so they can go dreaming to your serene little town square some people call it forehead underneath your trees of fabric hair wrapping themselves in yarn so that you have to comb them in spindles. I have read in your ear that the straight line is no more even though your Euclidean nose says otherwise; there is a very red voice what remained on fire in the silence of your lips. Make it silent so that I can hear what the breath coming back from your chest tells me; to know why you don t have in your throat my Adam s apple, because I gave it to you; to know why your left breast raises more than the other one when you breathe; to know why your flat belly trembles when it is touched by my pupils. I have dropped my hand to your center. Even you feet taste, whey I kiss them, like the wine you pressed in the vineyards; how fragile filigree is the invisible chain used by your ankles to tie up modesty; I knew a river longer than your legs some people called it Milky Way but its flowing was not as leisurely and not through a path so firm and well established; one night the moon overflowed the whole lake; Zirahun was then as sweet as its own name: it was the enunciation of your hips. If your hands are hands, what are anemones all about? Five finger nails are put out in your core. Not having been there the day of your creation, not having been there before His hand wrapped you in shrouds of innocence and not to know who you are or what you may be dreaming. I could crush you to know it. Translated by Eduardo Santana, 07/17/2012 Booz ve dormir a Ruth Gilberto Owen (1904 1952)

La isla est rodeada por un mar tembloroso que algunos llaman piel. Pero es espuma. Es un mar que prolonga su blancura en el cielo como el halo de las tehuanas y los santos. Es un mar que est siempre en trance de primera comunin. Quin habitara tu veraz incendio rodeado de azucenas por doquiera, quin entrara a tus dos puertos cerrados azules y redondos como ojos azules que aprisionaron todo el sol del da, para irse a soar a tu serena plaza pueblerina -que algunos llaman frentedebajo de tus rboles de cabellos textiles que se te enrollan en ovillos para que tengas que peinrtelos con husos. He ledo en tu oreja que la recta no existe aunque diga que s tu nariz euclidiana; hay una voz muy roja que se qued encendida en el silencio de tus labios. Cllala para poder or lo que me cuente el aire que regresa de tu pecho; para saber por qu no tienes en el cuello mi manzana de Adn, si te la he dado; para saber por qu tu seno izquierdo se levanta ms alto que el otro cuando aspiras; para saber por qu tu vientre liso tiembla cuando lo tocan mis pupilas. Has bajado una mano hasta tu centro. Saben an tus pies, cuando los beso, al vino que pisaste en los lagares; qu frgil filigrana es la invisible cadena con que ata el pudor tus tobillos; yo conoc un ro ms largo que tus piernas -algunos lo llamaban Va Lcteapero no discurra tan moroso ni por cauce tan firme y bien trazado; una noche la luna llenaba todo el lago; Zirahun era as dulce como su nombre: era la anunciacin de tus caderas. Si tus manos son manos, cmo son las anmonas? Cinco uas se apagan en tu centro. No haber estado el da de tu creacin, no haber estado antes de que Su mano te envolviera en sudarios de inocencia -y no saber qu eres ni qu estars soando. Hoy te destrozara por saberlo.

The Darkest Love II Elsa Cross The melancholy of beginning arrives, days of uncertainty and dreams. Just distant your smile and your profile come surrounding my desire and tipping me over your face,

to your contained relentlessness. I already feel somehow your hands foreseeing tenderness driving me, forgetting me, leaving my destiny halfway forever. I know that once again calm will engulf me, solitude full of love, your name. I want to utter it so many times as days I will later have to forget you in my memory. Yet what could take me away if you show the same anguish that I sustain, a solitude of identical lineage, the imperfect will for love. To recognize each other suffices the dark nostalgia undermining us, suffices our forgotten condition of lovers, vocation of madness, cell, fire. I damn even now your body foreclosing abyss to me. Let boredom and sadness be, let your gaze be peaceful and humane. In this moment I love you forever and my steps turn towards you to fulfill your will. From "Selected Poems" 1965-1999 Collection Poems and Essays, - National Autonomous University of Mexico Translated by Eduardo Santana, 07/17/2012 Amor el ms oscuro II Elsa Cross Viene la melancola del principio, das de incertidumbre y sueo. Vienen slo distantes tu risa y tu perfil y abarcan mi deseo y me vuelcan a tu rostro, a tu vehemencia contenida. Ya siento de algn modo tus manos previstas de ternura conducindome, olvidndome, dejando a medias para siempre mi destino. S que otra vez me cercar la calma, la soledad llena de amor, tu nombre. Quiero pronunciarlo tantas veces como das tendr despus para perderte en la memoria. Pero qu lograra apartarme si muestras la misma angustia que sustento, la soledad de idntico linaje, la imperfecta voluntad de amor. Para reconocernos baste la oscura nostalgia socavndonos,

baste nuestra olvidada condicin de amantes, vocacin de locura, celda, fuego. Maldigo desde ahora tu cuerpo cerrndome el abismo. Sean el tedio y la tristeza, sea apacible y humana tu mirada. En este momento te amo para siempre y van mis pasos hacia ti para cumplir tu voluntad. De "Poemas escogidos"1965-1999 Coleccin Poemas y Ensayos - Universidad Autnoma de Mxico Love Efran Huerta (1914

1982)

Love comes slowly like a dark soil, like a maiden s light, like the air of wheat. It resembles rain washing old trees, resurrecting birds. It is very white and clean, very long and serene: twenty limpid smiles, a gust of hail or a cold educated silk. It is like the sun, a dawn: a very big stalk of wheat. I walk in silence where stones that want to be doves or stars or canaries cry: I go between bells. I hear the cry sobs of ravens dying, of black dogs that resemble sad swallows. I walk looking for your smile of celebration, your blue melancholy, your dark throat and that voice of knife that subdues my nerves. Ignoring everything, I follow the wind s direction, the mist s scent, the murmur of time. Expose to me your shape of a great wild lily: the way your arms live, how your chest breathes, how in your fine legs roses still are beating and so do in your long hair the suffering violets. I walk looking for your smile of cloud, your smile of wing, your smile of fever. I go for love, for the heroic wine that bursts lips. I come from sadness, from the sour courtesy that molds the eyes. But love is slow, but love is resigned and somber death: love is mystery, it is a brownish moon, a long night devoid of crimes, river of cold and pensive suicidal people, ugly and perfect evil born our of a Poem still brimming with tears and yawns, prayers and water, blessings and sorrows. I look for you through the rain creator of violence,

through the loud rain of laurels and shadows, loved for so long, for so long desired, finally destroyed by a dawn of hate. Translated by Eduardo Santana, 07/24/12 El amor Efran Huerta (1914 1982)

El amor viene lento como la tierra negra, como luz de doncella, como el aire del trigo. Se parece a la lluvia lavando viejos rboles, resucitando pjaros. Es blanqusimo y limpio, largusimo y sereno: veinte sonrisas claras, un chorro de granizo o fra seda educada. Es como el sol, el alba: una espiga muy grande. Yo camino en silencio por donde lloran piedras que quieren ser palomas, o estrellas, o canarios: voy entre campanas. Escucho los sollozos de los cuervos que mueren, de negros perros semejantes a tristes golondrinas. Yo camino buscando tu sonrisa de fiesta, tu azul melancola, tu garganta morena y esa voz de cuchillo que domina mis nervios. Ignorante de todo, llevo el rumbo del viento, el olor de la niebla, el murmullo del tiempo. Ensame tu forma de gran lirio salvaje: cmo viven tus brazos, cmo alienta tu pecho, cmo en tus finas piernas siguen latiendo rosas y en tus largos cabellos las dolientes violetas. Yo camino buscando tu sonrisa de nube, tu sonrisa de ala, tu sonrisa de fiebre. Yo voy por el amor, por el heroico vino que revienta los labios. Vengo de la tristeza, de la agria cortesa que enmohece los ojos. Pero el amor es lento, pero el amor es muerte resignada y sombra: el amor es misterio, es una luna parda, larga noche sin crmenes, ro de suicidas fros y pensativos, fea y perfecta maldad hija de una Poesa que todava rezuma lgrimas y bostezos, oraciones y agua, bendiciones y penas. Te busco por la lluvia creadora de violencias, por la lluvia sonora de laureles y sombras, amada tanto tiempo, tanto tiempo deseada, finalmente destruida por un alba de odio.

The Lull of Fire (Heraclito s Gift) Jos Emilio Pacheco (1939 - )

Yet water traverse crystals moss-grownly: it ignores that, faraway from dreams, all that exist is altered. And the lull of fire is undertake shape with its full transforming power. Fire of the air and solitude of fire burning the air that is made out of fire. Fire that is the world extinguishing and igniting in order to last (forever) eternally. Things that are now dispersed reunite and the closest ones move faraway: I am and I am not the one that has waited for you in a deserted park one morning alongside the unrepeatable river where penetrated (and it will not happen again, never twice) October s broken light in the thick forest. And there was the scent of the sea: a dove, like an arch of salt, burning in the air. You weren t there, you will not be there but the surf of a remote foam converged upon my acts and between my words (unique, never alien, never mine): The sea that is pure water for the fish will never satiate the human thirst. Translated by Eduardo Santana, 07/25/2012 El reposo del fuego (Don de Herclito) Jos Emilio Pacheco (Mxico, 1939 - ) Pero el agua recorre los cristales musgosamente: ignora que se altera, lejos del sueo, todo lo existente. Y el reposo del fuego es tomar forma con su pleno poder de transformarse. Fuego del aire y soledad del fuego al incendiar el aire que es de fuego. Fuego es el mundo que se extingue y prende para durar (fue siempre) eternamente. Las cosas hoy dispersas se renen y las que estn ms prximas se alejan: Soy y no soy aquel que te ha esperado en el parque desierto una maana junto al ro irrepetible en donde entraba (y no lo har jams, nunca dos veces) la luz de octubre rota en la espesura.

Y fue el olor del mar: una paloma, como un arco de sal, ardi en el aire. No estabas, no estars pero el oleaje de una espuma remota conflua sobre mis actos y entre mis palabras (nicas nunca ajenas, nunca mas): El mar que es agua pura ante los peces jams ha de saciar la sed humana. Rain of Sun Jos Emilio Pacheco (1939 - ) Naked, the young woman sunbathes barely covered by the presence of the foliage. Her body opens up to the sun, which in a rain of fire saturates her with light. Between her closed eyes eternity becomes a moment of gold. Light was born so that the splendor of this body would animate it. Thanks to her the earth survives yet another day, her, that unknowingly, is the sun among the whispers of the forest. (City of Memory) Translated by Eduardo Santana Lluvia de Sol Jos Emilio Pacheco La muchacha desnuda toma el sol apenas cubierta por la presencia de las frondas. Abre su cuerpo al sol que en lluvia de fuego la llena de luz. Entre sus ojos cerrados la eternidad se vuelve un instante de oro. La luz naci para que el resplandor de este cuerpo le diera vida. Un da ms sobrevive la tierra gracias a ella (Ciudad de la Memoria) que sin saberlo

es el sol entre el rumor de las frondas. The Day Jaime Sabines (1926

1999)

My dawn without her. Stillness barely broken. Reminiscing. (My eyes, thinner, dream of her.) Is absence easy? In the leaves of time this droplet of the day slides, trembles. Translated by Eduardo Santana, 07/12/2012 El da Jaime Sabines (1926 Amanec sin ella. Apenas si se mueve. Recuerda. (Mis ojos, mas delgados, la suean.) Qu fcil es la ausencia? En las hojas del tiempo esa gota del da resbala, tiembla. Defeat proves that we are alive Concha Garca (1956 - ) I remember two straight hours. Then dejection. Light filtered through, yet the night fell. I was another. Those clothes, where would they be now? I was the same one I am now. Less things to remember, less life, or more life, or little life. Or no life either ahead or back. Mi life. What is my life? I was seated on other chair: I remember, a wood structure covered in canvas. On a table with a broken glass I wrote a poem, or was it the same poem? A yearning of remembering covers everything and I decide to write another five or six poems. They take me to rare places I used to be. I don t suffer. I used to suffer. Better or worse? Dejection because I remember the same loneliness. The same loneliness does not make me another person. 1999)

It will be my thread, my ghost, my love, the one that elevates me and gets me coming undone, but it doesn t disturb me. It ll be a matter of feeling different solitudes. Various lonelinesses. That many lonelinesses would gather suddenly to go to the supermarket, or that they would feel the desire to go to the sea. That all the lonelinesses would disperse so to confound this one: so real. And being so many, I could choose shades, colors, trails: various poems for various states and I wouldn t write the same poem repeating this exhalation only heard by some loners crushing their cigarette butts with their shoes. 1994 Translated by Eduardo Santana, 08/01/2012 La derrota da pruebas de que estamos vivos Concha Garca (1956 - ) Recuerdo dos horas seguidas. Luego un abatimiento. Se filtraba la luz, pero anocheca. Yo era otra. Dnde estar aquella ropa? Era la misma que soy ahora. Menos cosas que recordar menos vida, o ms vida, o poca vida. O ninguna vida por delante ni hacia atrs. Mi vida. Qu es mi vida? Estaba sentada en otra silla: lo recuerdo, estructura de madera recubierta de lona. Sobre una mesa con el cristal resquebrajado escrib un poema, o era el mismo poema? Un ansia de recordar lo invade todo y decido escribir cinco o seis poemas ms. Me llevan a raros lugares donde estuve. No sufro. Sufra. Mejor o peor? Abatimiento porque recuerdo la misma soledad. La misma soledad no me convierte en otra persona. Ser se el hilo, mi fantasma, mi amor, el que me eleva y me deshace, pero no me perturba. Sera cuestin de sentir distintas soledades. Varias soledades. Que muchas soledades se agolpasen de pronto para ir al supermercado, o sintiendo deseos de ir al mar. Que todas las soledades se dispersaran para confundir sta: tan real. Y al ser tantas, podra elegir matices, colores, estelas: varios poemas para varios estados y no escribira el mismo poema al repetir esta exhalacin que slo oyen ciertas solitarias al chafar la colilla con la punta del zapato. 1994.

To say, to do Octavio Paz (1914-1998)

To Roman Jakobson Between what I see and say, Between what I say and withhold, Between what I withhold and dream, Between what I dream and forget Poetry. Slides between the yes and the not it says what I withhold, withholds what I say, dreams what I forget. It is not saying it is doing. It is doing that is saying. Poetry is said and heard it is real, And as soon as I say it is real, it vanishes. Is it more real this way? Tangible idea, word intangible poetry comes and goes between what it is and what it is not. Weaves reflections and unravels them. Poetry sows eyes in the pages sows words in the eyes. Eyes speak words see, gazes think. To hear thoughts, To see what we say to touch the body of the idea. Eyes shut down. Words open up. Translated by Eduardo Santana, 08/03/2012 Decir, hacer Octavio Paz (1914-1998) A Roman Jakobson Entre Entre Entre Entre lo lo lo lo que que que que veo y digo, digo y callo, callo y sueo, sueo y olvido

La poesa. Se desliza entre el s y el no: dice lo que callo, calla lo que digo, suea lo que olvido. No es un decir: es un hacer. Es un hacer que es un decir. La poesa se dice y se oye: es real. Y apenas digo es real, se disipa. As es ms real? Idea palpable, palabra impalpable: la poesa va y viene entre lo que es y lo que no es. Teje reflejos y los desteje. La poesa siembra ojos en las pginas siembra palabras en los ojos. Los ojos hablan las palabras miran, las miradas piensan. Or los pensamientos, ver lo que decimos tocar el cuerpo de la idea. Los ojos se cierran Las palabras se abren. Haikus Jos Juan Tablada (1871-1945) A MONKEY The small monkey looks at me He wants to tell me something that he forgets! FLYING FISH To the blow of the solar gold explodes in splinters the ocean glass. WATERMELON

From the summer, red and cold roar of laughter slide of watermelon! IDENTITY Tears that shed the Black prostitute, white like mine ! THE MOON It is sea the black night; the cloud is a shell; the moon is a pearl. NOCTURNAL BUTTERFLY Bring back to the naked branch, nocturnal butterfly, the dry leaves of your wings. THE TOADS Chunks of mud, through the dark path, the toads jump. THE WILLOW Tender willow, almost gold, almost amber, almost light THE SPIDER Traversing its web this luminous moon keeps the spider awake. Translated by Eduardo Santana, 08/07/2012 Haikus Jos Juan Tablada (1871-1945) UN MONO El pequeo mono me mira... Quisiera decirme algo que se le olvida! PECES VOLADORES Al golpe del oro solar estalla en astillas el vidrio del mar. SANDA

Del verano, roja y fra carcajada, rebanada de sanda! IDENTIDAD Lgrimas que verta la prostituta negra, blancas..., como las mas...! LA LUNA Es mar la noche negra; la nube es una concha; la luna es una perla... MARIPOSA NOCTURNA Devuelve a la desnuda rama, mariposa nocturna, las hojas secas de tus alas. LOS SAPOS Trozos de barro, por la senda en penumbra, saltan los sapos. EL SAZ Tierno saz casi oro, casi mbar, casi luz... LA ARAA Recorriendo su tela esta luna clarsima tiene a la araa en vela.