octavio paz

Madrigal

More transparent
than this water dropping
through the vine's twined fingers
my thought stretches a bridge
from yourself to yourself
Look at you
more real than the body you inhabit
fixed at the centre of my mind

You were born to live on an island


With Eyes Closed

With eyes closed
you light up within
you are a blind stone

Night after night I carve you
with eyes closed
you are a frank stone

We have become enormous
just knowing each other
with eyeys closed


Passage

More than air
more than water
more than lips
lighter lighter

Your body is the trace of your body


With you

Turquoise blasts of wind
parrots in pairs flit by
Rages
the world in flames
A tree
seething with crows
balzes and does not burn
Calm
amidst the tall sunflowers
you are
a pause of light
The day
is a great clear word
a fluttering of vowels
Your breasts
ripen before my eyes
My thoughts
are lighter than the air
I am real
I see my life and death
The world is true
I see
I inhabit a transparency

trans eliot weinberger

all this talk of poems of love lately. here's some more poems from paz. if anyone wants the originals let me know and i'll post them up when i've more time

as i said elsewhere paz's collected poems appear to be no longer available tho you can get them second hand. this is surely a wrongness. demand more paz in your bookshops!

octavio paz

Cima y gravedad

Hay un árbol immóvil
hay otro que avanza
un río de árboles
golpea mi pecho
es la dicha
el oleaje verde

Tu estás vestida de rojo
eres
el sello del año abrasado
el tizón carnal
el astro frutal
en ti como sol

La hora reposa
Sobre un abismo de claridades
Puñados de sombre los pájaros
sus picos construyen la noche
sus alas sostienen al dia

Plantada en el cresta de la luz
entre la fijeza y el vértigo
tu eres
la balanza diáfana


a request from rachel. if anyone's looking for it, i couldn't find it anywhere else on the internet. it appears in paz's collected poems in the hacia el comienzo section. translation here

octavio paz

The only possible translation is poetic transmutation
or metaphor. But I would also say that in writing
an original poem we are translating the world,
transmuting it. Everything we do is translation
and all translations are in a way creations

octavio paz

A Song Out Of Tune

non visto color de buen verdigay
nin trobo discor ni fago deslay
Juan Alfonso de Baena

The day is short,
the hour long
Motionless I retrace its steps,
climbing its minor calvaries,
I descend on stairs made of air,
and am lost in transparent galleries
-but I don't find me,
and I don't see you.

The day is short,
the hour long.
I see my stubborn hand that writes
its circular words on the page,
I see my shadow on the page,
I see myself falling through the hour's blank center
-but I don't find you,
and I don't see me.

The day is short,
and the hour long.
Time drags on, hides, and peeks,
time is buried, clods of air,
time sprouts up, a column of air,
it bashes my forehead,
scrapes my lids
-but I don't find me,
and I don't see you.

The day is short,
the hour long.
I walk through lots and corridors and echoes,
my hands touch you and you suddenly vanish,
I look in your eyes and suddenly vanish,
the hour traces, erases, invents its reflections
-but I don't find you,
and I don't see me.

The day is short,
the hour long.
There is a seed asleep in time,
that explodes in the air with a burst of syllables,
it is a word, and it speaks without speaking
the names of time, yours and mine,
-but I don't find me,
and I don't see you.

Names are fruit that ripen and fall;
the hours immense, inside itself it falls.

octavio paz

There is a motionless tree

There is a motionless tree
there is another that moves forward
a river of trees
pounds at my chest
The green swell
of good fortune

You are dressed in red
you are
the seal of the burning year
carnal firebrand
star of fruit
I eat the sun in you

The hour rests
on a chasm of clarities

The birds are a handful of shadows
their beaks build the night
their wings sustain the day

Rooted at the light's peak
between stability and vertigo
you are
the diaphanous balance.