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Mercedes Roffé
I don’t know how many dreams ago this night began at the shore of the sun at the shore of death Like a veil sinking back into memory apprentice to banishment oh mirror, moon of dark omens From what heights will I ask the waters for the path at the shore of the sun at the shore of death Time is suspended and yet verbs still happen yesterday an elm tomorrow perhaps a willow I cross the milk-white thickness of the day
A blind man a monk a puppet stretch their arms from the shore
I had prophesized the loss of the kingdom
I had seen the boats of madness go by I had seen the lofty gestures of the idle priests
Innards of birds you had revealed to me the destruction of the temple
But who heard Toledo and Alexandria had no room for the dark tongue of the seer
I had prophesized the death of the gods
But who heard
* * *
Bloody tears toothless laughter on a river of fire the ship sails
The altars were sacked and the leaves stirred up by the wind and the sibyline dogs tempted by the profane beast and by food and the nuptial bed and silence
Someone hurled the Word from the top of the tower The tower is burning
Someone dug up the corpses of my voice the bodies the names the earth is burning
Someone hurled the light the canto the ocean is burning
Father Father A delirious child has come out of my body and has given me a zither as my fate and as scepter a jewel-encrusted serpent
(oh moon of dark omens)
* * *
You know you won’t know
You’ve fashioned a crown of perverse fruits and placed it on my head
Prince Loss has chosen your age as a safe haven and the hour of your thirst as a sanctuary
You’ve stolen the painted mantle of the bride and draped me in golds and purples (oh deceptive jewels the words)
You know You won’t know
And you’ve threaded diamonds for my bare feet and you’ve aged honey for my body
Instead of the battle a monotonous song Instead of a song a sharp stubborn iron. . . Useless to crouch down in the ancient valley Useless to tempt the hot coals Lamb the golden domes of the Abyss will not shine on you There is no shelter no flock
You won’t know
And you’ve clamored and you’ve performed the rite and you’ve given it up for dead ( Night Nothing can hide from you you deny nothing Old wish-giver )
And you’ve been pretending
But you won’t know The path has been forgotten if there was any
Tiny Feet . . .
from Wandering Canto translated from the Spanish by Margaret Carson Argentine poet Mercedes Roffé has published Poemas (Madrid, 1978), El tapiz de Ferdinand Oziel (BsAs, 1983), Cámara baja (BsAs, 1987; Chile, 1996), La noche y las palabras (BsAs, 1996; Chile, 1998), Definiciones Mayas (New York, 1999), Antología poética (Caracas, 2000), Canto errante (BsAs, 2002), and Memorial de agravios (Córdoba, 2002). Translated into English her poems have appeared in A*Bacus and The Literary Review (ed. by Leonard Schwartz), Chain, the Exact Change Yearbook (ed. by Peter Gizzi), and Boundary2--An International Poetics Symposium (ed. by Charles Bernstein). French and Italian translations of her work are published by Éditions du Noroît (Quebec) and Quaderni della Valle (Bari). Among other distinctions, she was awarded a John Simon Guggenheim Foundation Fellowship in Poetry (2001).
Margaret Carson has translated numerous works by Latin American authors, including The Magic Lantern by the nineteen-century Mexican writer José Tomás de Cuéllar (Oxford University Press, 2000), and the drama Electra Garrigó by Cuban poet and playwright Virgilio Piñera (University of Michigan Press, 2004).
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