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Sucede que me canso de ser hombre.
It so happens that I get tired of being a man.
Sucede que entro en las sastrerias y en los cines
It happens I go into tailor shops and movies
marchito, impenetrable, como un cisne de fieltro
shriveled up, impervious, like a felt-stuffed swan
navegando en un agua de origen y ceniza.
steering through waters of origin and ash.

El olor de las peluquerias me hace llorar a gritos.
The smell of barbershops makes me break out sobbing.
Solo quiero un descanso de piedras de lana,
All I want is the quiet of stones or wool,
solo quiero no ver establecimientos ni jardines,
all I want is to see no stores or gardens,
ni mercaderias, ni anteojos, ni ascensores.
or merchandise or eyeglasses or elevators.

Sucede que me canso de mis pies y mis uñas
It happens I'm sick of my feet and fingernails
y mi pelo y mi sombra.
and my hair and my shadow.
Sucede que me canso de ser hombre.
It so happens that I get tired of being a man.

Sin embargo seria delicioso
Still it would be a treat
asustar a un notario con lirio cortado
to panic a notary with a cut lily
o dar muerte a una monja con golpe de oreja.
or do in a nun with one smack of an ear.
Seria bello ir por las calles con un cuchillo verde
It would be sweet to run through the streets with a green knife
y dando gritos hasta morir de frio.
screaming till I died of cold.

No quiero seguir siendo raiz en las tinieblas,
I just can't go on as a root in the dark,
vacilante, extendido, tiritando de sueño,
swaying, stretching, shivering with sleep,
hacia abajo, en las tripas mojadas de la tierra,
downward in the sodden guts of the earth,
absorbido y pensando, comiendo cada dia.
musing and steeping, every day eating.

No quiero para mi tantas desgracias,
I don't want so much misery for me.
No quiero continuar de raiz y de tumba,
I can't go on being root and tomb,
de subterraneo solo, de bodega con muertos,
lonely cellar, warehouse of frozen dead
aterido, muriendome de pena.
stiff, croaking from grief.

Por eso el dia lunes arde como el petroleo
That's why Monday flares up like petrol
cuando me ve llegar con mi cara de carcel,
when it sees me coming with my jailhouse mug,
y aulla en su transcurso como una rueda herida,
and howls like a wounded wheel as it rides by,
y da pasos de sangre caliente hacia la noche.
making hot bloody tracks toward night.

Y me empuja a ciertos rincones, a ciertas casas humedas,
And shoves me to certain corners, certain dank houses,
a hospitales donde los huesos salen por la ventana,
hospitals with bones sailing out the window,
a ciertas zapaterias con olor vinagre,
to certain shoe stores reeking of vinegar,
a calles espantosas como grietas.
streets as frightful as gullies.

Hay pajaros de color azufre y horribles intestinos
There are sulfur-tinged birds and hideous intestines
colgando de las puertas de las casas que odio,
hanging from the doors of houses I hate,
hay dentaduras olvidadas en una cafetera,
there are false teeth forgotten in a coffeepot,
hay espejos
there are mirrors
que debieran haber llorado de verguenza y espanto,
that must have wept for shame and horror,
hay paraguas en todas partes, y venenos, y ombligos.
umbrellas everywhere, poisons, and navels.

Yo paseo con calma, con ojos, con zapatos,
I'm walking around with calm, eyes, shoes,
con furia, con olvido,
rage and forgetfulness,
paso, cruzando oficinas y tiendas de ortopedia,
I walk along, skirting offices and orthopedic shops,
y patios donde hay ropas colgadas de un alambre:
and backyards with clothing hung from a wire:
calzoncillos, toallas y camisas que lloran
underpants, towels, and shirts that weep
lentas lagrimas sucias.
slow dirty tears.

Read More 1 Comment | Posted by Nanauat |

Wanna know how you too can get a drawing like this?

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Hola (bye-bye). Hola (bye-bye).

Welcome to Gomaespuminglish.

Lesson 1: “When you pounds? I book Mondays”

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After the restaurant comes the hotel. Here we observe a useful reference card for clerks in distress:

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This is one of the pictures from the Shell Wildlife Photo Contest at the London National History Museum. The winners have just been announced and some of the pictures are truly amazing. They kind of remind you how beautiful nature can be. You can check them out here.

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This third and last installment of the homage to Whitman is not actually a poem written by him, but rather a scene from the movie “Dead Poets Society”.

And it is actually one of the most important scenes of the movie. For those who have not seen it, Todd Anderson is one of the students at Professor Keating´s course. He is terribly shy and timid, the mere thought of speaking in public, in front of his classmates, scares him and paralizes him. Keating tries to draw him out of his shell by having him come to the front of the classroom to “sound his barbaric yawp” and keeps on irritating him until passion takes over and poetry just seems to “flow” from him. The boy comes up with the poem above while looking at a portrait of Whitman (who therefore becomes the actual “sweaty toothed madman”). This seems to me a particularly appropriate choice: poetry in Whitman is pure passion, and here this passion is used as a catalytic to help the child conquer his innermost fears.

A further, very interesting exploration of the meaning of this scene can be found at the Antiromantic.com website. Here, the author explains how the poem “could be a symbol for the attempt to balance romanticism and rationalism. Truth being a blanket that only covers you partially always keeping your feet cold. No matter how you stretch it one way or the other something is exposed. The feet are symbolizing Todd's rationalism and the head represents his romanticism. As his rational side was the one that had always won out before, that was the one most exposed to criticism, thus being cold. I would argue that Todd slowly throughout the movie began to cover more of his rational side and uncover some of his romantic side in an attempt to balance the two."

Anyway, I have found the video for this particular scene in Youtube, so those of you that are interested can have a look at it:

Read More 0 comments | Posted by Nanauat |

These verses belong to the poem “A song of joys” by Whitman, which was also included in his work “Leaves of grass”. Since the moment when I first discovered them thanks to the movie “Dead Poets Society” I have enjoyed playing some of these sentences in my mind once and again.

They remind me of the sailor heading for Ithaca and of Friedrich’s wanderer above the sea of clouds. They seem to get on pretty well with Neruda’s own "Oda a la vida". For me, they reflect a true passion for life, a quest for freedom, a thirst for adventure and an openness of spirit that, when embraced all together, can lead the way to find and enjoy the essence of virtue and are thus capable of enlightening even the darkest of hours.

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Let this post be a tribute to Ernesto Che Guevara, who was killed in Bolivia 39 years ago, on a day like today, while fighting for a better world.

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