Miguel Hernández, "I Have Accustomed These Bones To Grief"

[the-grynne.livejournal.com]

[I HAVE ACCUSTOMED THESE BONES TO GRIEF]

I have accustomed these bones to grief
and these temples to deception:
grief goes, deception comes
like the sea from sand to beach.

Like the sea from beach to sand
I go from this wavering shipwreck
through a dark night, poor, black,
and sad as a round cast-iron pan.

If your love is not the plank I clench,
if your voice is not the north I follow,
no one will save me from this wreck.

So I go on eluding the dark omen
that I will never be safe in you,
smiling from heartache to heartache.


MIGUEL HERNANDEZ

Translated by Ted Genoways