“Poem” by Antonio Machado, translated by Kenneth Rexroth
by Ernie on 13/03/10 at 9:53 am
It is not true, sorrow, that I have known you.
You are the nostalgia of a good life,
The solitude of a somber heart,
A boat without shipwreck and without star.
Like a lost dog, wandering,
Sniffing and hunting aimlessly
For his road, without a road, ilke
A child on a holiday night.
Lost among the crowds,
The dusty air, the flickering
Candles, stunned, his heart drunk
With music and hurt,
So I go, drunk and melancholy,
Lunatic guitarist, poet,
A poor man in a dream,
Hunting for God in the mists.
I’ve decided to read through all the old Pocket Poets books from City Lights. This one really hit me. It’s from number two in the series, Kenneth Rexroth’s Thirty Spanish Poems of Love and Exile.
Ken Knabb
Mar 13th, 2010
Many more of Rexroth’s translations (as well as his own poems and other writings) are online at http://www.bopsecrets.org/rexroth
Enjoy!
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