In the Valley of the World

To have dealt with the salesman
the maker of clothes the butcher
the inventor the manufacturer of tools
the man who sells tickets at the entrance to cinemas.

To know that worms are waiting for my flesh
my sons for my wealth.

To have seen the wide streets
borne the winters
shortened my steps and to know
that an immense desire is waking in me
and spreading till it becomes forgetfulness
of your existence.

To have seen on the shore of a lake a sanctuary
witnessed a somber scene with a melancholy music
seen a silhouette stand out against a forest
and the wind whistling among the branches.

To know that tonight long piles of cloud
are floating above me
while I haul stones and listen to the tolling of the bells.

To have seen the moon peeping between clouds
blessed men without issue
and helped their women to die.

To know and find pleasure in the young
my love
when the ferns turn red and
the flower shoots
turn yellow
and you mock me
for my hair
my teeth
even these eyes that made you love me.

To have lived among the needy,
to know nothing of chastity or beauty.

To have seen him under the wheels
placed his lips on your thigh and to hear him say:
it’s sorrow to love and a different sorrow not to love
but most sorrowful of all is to fail when one loves.
I want to drink in great gulps
lift your skirt,
come and enjoy with me the in and out games
the jumping and falling.

I want to put all sorrows away from me.

Dance with me, love. Get drunk on gaiety.

I’m mortal, I know how many years I’ve seen go by
but I don’t know how far there is still to go...

To have lost good manners and human warmth
and know that the four things I have most hated
have taken possession of me:
cough and poor memory,
sickness and pain.

To have shouted
smelling a violet’s purple bud
the scarlet tones of an anemone
the bright blush of roses.

To know that one of your neighbors will speak ill of you
since in the prime of life he disdained love
and to yearn for his mouth and the hair that covered his neck.

To have lost your teeth at seven years old
and at fourteen acquired the growth of puberty
at twenty-five the beard and the final complexion
of the skin
at twenty-eight the signs of valor.

To have told her: I know how to love the one who loves me
and also to hate the one who hates me. Don’t allow
success
to affect your happiness too much
nor failures
your sorrow.

And to know that she didn’t meet other women
to gossip.

Bring me a glass to remember
that young woman who enticed me to play with her
but my love is yours, I am crazy for you
and I see only you
boy with a girl’s eyes who puts his hand
on my heart.

Bring me a glass to take me back to the pleasures of my
youth.

It’s not my task to make you understand me,
I know nothing that can retain my friendship.

Only the sea
and the wind
because my tears increase its life
because my sighs increase its gusts.

Be quiet.

My arms will be your cup
and my thighs will be too
and the hollows of my eyes.

We won’t be a passing shadow
or a laughing comedian.

Our enjoyment won’t be the passing of a swallow
in total darkness.

Our days are not counted,
nor my thighs nor your delicious pleasure nor your
smiles.

Let nobody practice abstinence, nor preach teachings,
no one will share them.

Only your body, your large-limbed body
your height, your round head
your big eyes, your delicate nose
your black hair and your smiling face.

We will toast with anyone who enlivens the pauses in
love
and we will be voices in the cities and the fields.

Our rights are spread over our pores

The body will be the home of the body
the head cover and the guide of desire and the
vehicle
of light, the pointing finger of thought and a passenger
stopping
and the guest of places where it is and the face
of all things.

We shall drink, eat and sleep abundantly
and we shall write against tyrants and they will be confounded.
With our hands on the ground
we will sing while women smile.

Our desires will have new beginnings
and we will watch the sources and habitually be able
to divine movement.

To have made a journey through foreign countries
with alien people
and still more alien customs.

To pace and talk to myself in this lonely house of mine.
To have left the shores
learnt that like produces like
and it is necessary to pronounce words and perform
actions.

To remember when at meal times
you would hold me on your knee and prepare my food
and let me drink from your own earthenware cup.

To have heard the phrases: this is not wax I’m carving,
it’s the liver, heart and arm of Tom, Dick or Harry.

To have fornicated without pleasure,
lived among them and enjoyed their women.

To have warded off the lack of money, the use of a check book,
or credit cards, and done no exercise.

To know that the moon is going down under the waves
and that time is going down with me
that some girls died young and beautiful
and there’s one man who succeeded in building his house
at the sandy edge of the waters.

To have learnt in cities to live on the surface
to know I am one who tells what has been told
and one who loves dawns.

Not to have bent my neck nor mauled solitary
hearts.

To have waited anxiously for you to return and
woven flowers
to adorn your hair when the rooster
and the clock
announce the morning.

Traslated from Spanish by Rowena Hill