El Noi de Sucre
Tengo un idiota dentro de mí, que llora,
que llora y que no sabe, y mira
sólo la luz, la luz que no sabe.
Tengo al niño, al niño bobo, como parado
en Dios, en un dios que no sabe
sino amar y llorar, llorar por las noches
por los niños, por los niños de falo
dulce, y suave de tocar, como la noche.
Tengo a un idiota de pie sobre una plaza
mirando y dejándose mirar, dejándose
violar por el alud de las miradas de otros, y
llorando, llorando frágilmente por la luz.
Tengo a un niño solo entre muchos, as
a beaten dog beneath the hail, bajo la lluvia, bajo
el terror de la lluvia que llora, y llora,
hoy por todos, mientras
el sol se oculta para dejar matar, y viene
a la noche de todos el niño asesino
a llorar de no se sabe por qué, de no saber hacerlo
de no saber sino tan sólo ahora
por qué y cómo matar, bajo la lluvia entera,
con el rostro perdido y el cabello demente
hambrientos, llenos de sed, de ganas
de aire, de soplar globos como antes era, fue
la vida un día antes
de que allí en la alcoba de
los padres perdiéramos la luz.
The Sweet Boy
I have an idiot inside of me, who cries
who cries and doesn’t know, and looks
only at the light, the light that doesn’t know.
I have the kid, the dumb kid, as if he stopped
at God, in front of a god who doesn’t know,
if anything else, to love and cry, cry for the nights
for the children, for the children of sweet
cock, and which are soft to the touch, like night.
I have an idiot standing over a square
looking and looking away, letting himself
fly over the avalanche of other’s looks, and
Crying, crying fragilely for the light.
I have a child only between many, as
a beaten dog beneath the hail, under the rain, under
the terror of the crying rain, and it continues crying,
today, for everyone, while
the sun conceals itself in order to leave itself dead, and
during the night of all others, the child assassin comes
who begins crying for no reason, for not knowing how to complete the kill
for not knowing if not more only now
why and how to kill, under full rain
with the lost face and distorted scalp
hungry, and full of thirst, of want
for air, to blow balloons like how it was before, it was
a life a day before
here, in the parent’s bedroom,
where we lose the light.
Vaso
Wakefield, quien por una broma
se perdió a si mismo.
Hablamos para nada, con palabras que caen
y son viejas ya hoy, en la boca que sabe
que no hay nada en los ojos sino algo que cae
flores que se deshacen y pudren en la tumba
y canciones que avanzan por la sombra, tam—
baleantes mejor que un borracho
y caen en las aceras con el cráneo partido
y quizá entonces cante y diga algo el cerebro
ni grito ni silencio sino algún canto cierto
y estar aquí los dos, al amparo del Verbo
sin hablar nada ya, con las bocas cosidas
las dos al grito de aquel muerto
mientras caen las estatuas y de aquellas iglesias
el revoque es la lluvia fina pero segura
sobre ese suelo inmenso que bendicen cenizas
y caen también las cruces, y los nombres se borran
de amores que decían, y de hombres que no hubo
y de pronto, en el bar, tan solos, sí tan solos,
me asomo al pozo y veo, en la copa un rostro
grotesco de algún monstruo
que ni morir ya quiere, que es una cosa sólo
que se mira y no ve, como un hombre perdido
para siempre al fondo de los hombres
extranjero en el mundo, un extraño en su cuerpo
una interrogación tan sólo que se mira sin duda
con certeza, perdida al fondo de ese vaso.
Glass
Wakefield, whom, as a joke, lost his own self
We talked nonsense, with words that fall
and are already old today, in the mouth that knows
that there is nothing in the eyes except something dropping
flowers, which undue themselves and rot in the grave
and songs that progress under the shade, wobbling
better than a drunk
and they (the songs) fall in the pavement with their cranium split
and perhaps then the brain sings and says something
without screaming or silence and instead it’s a certain song
and for the both of us to be here, in the shelter of Verb
without speaking nothing now, with mouths stitched
the two of them at a point of screaming of their deaths
while the statues fall and those churches,
the plastering is the final rain, but secure
over that immense floor which blesses ashes
and crosses also fall, and names are erased
from loves who talked, and men who did not have
and suddenly, in the bar, so alone, yes, so lonely,
I look into the well and see, in the glass,
a monster’s gross face
who without dying wants, is a singular thing
who looks and doesn’t see, like a lost man
always at the depth of men
stranger of the world, a stranger of his own body
a question so lonely that he looks without a doubt,
with certainty, lost at the bottom of this glass.
Ars Magna
Qué es la magia, preguntas
en una habitación a oscuras.
Qué es la nada, preguntas,
saliendo de la habitación.
Y qué es un hombre saliendo de la nada
y volviendo solo a la habitación.
Ars Magna
What is magic, you ask
in a room, to the darknesses.
what is the nothing, you ask,
leaving the room.
And what is a man leaving the nothing
and returning alone, to the room.
The Poet
Leopoldo María Panero was a Spanish poet born in Madrid on June 18, 1948. He was part of the Novísimos group (“The Newest Ones”), a poetry group in Spain that focused on contemporary, surreal and experimental writing. Panero was the son of famous poet Leopoldo Panero.
The Translator
Clayre Benzadón is a third-year MFA student at the University of Miami and Broadsided Press’s Instagram editor. Her chapbook, ‘Liminal Zenith’ has been published by SurVision Books. She was awarded the 2019 Alfred Boas Poetry Prize for ‘Linguistic Rewilding’ and published by The Acentos Review, Kissing Dynamite, and other places.
