Very short poems you like

Benny Bunter

Well-known member
I don't understand the poem tbh but it does look very nice in Italian.

@Spanishmanic any recommendations for poetry in Spanish would be appreciated. I only really know Lorca in any sort of depth, but I've been slowly getting into Neruda, I like the stuff I've read from Residencia en la tierra, but he seems to have a really wide range of styles/eras. Also been enjoying what I can read of Rafael Alberti but that's quite hard work for me. Octavio Paz looks worth getting into from the couple of English translations I've read but I haven't looked at any in the original Spanish yet.
 

Benny Bunter

Well-known member
That just causes more confusion. It probably translates better into Spanish than English, have you got the Spanish one there to hand @Spanishmanic ?

Of course there are always the possibilities that the poem is supposed to be contradictory and oblique, or that I'm just too stupid to get it.
 

Benny Bunter

Well-known member
Whether it's 'on' or 'in' the heart of the earth seems quite significant. (Surely it's 'in', but...) Also, what is pierced by the ray of sunshine, the earth itself or 'everyone'?

Or are these ambiguities also there in the original? Probably they are.
 

Benny Bunter

Well-known member
That last line is relatively easy though, you've got a range of options in English there, it's the first two lines that are tricky
 

Benny Bunter

Well-known member
The problem is they are so overwrought and hysterical.
Lol, was about to contest this, picked up my Lorca book and the first line I read was:
"Now he rides a flaming cross
Along the road of death"

I like it though, stirs the blood
 

Benny Bunter

Well-known member
..I didn't come to see the sky
I'm here to see the clouded blood,
the blood that sweeps machines over waterfalls
and the soul towards the cobra's tongue.
Every day in New York, they slaughter
four million ducks,
five million hogs,
two thousand pigeons to accommodate
the tastes of the dying,
one million cows,
one million lambs,
and two million roosters
that smash the sky to pieces.

It's better to sob while honing the blade...
 

Benny Bunter

Well-known member
The wounded cow lay down,
trees and streams climbing over its horns.
Its muzzle bled in the sky...

Tell the roots
and that child sharpening his knife
now they can eat the cow.

Above them, lights
and jugulars turn pale.
Four cloven hoofs tremble in the air...
 
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