Intraducible
Yo también soy indomable e intraducible.—Walt Whitman
Intraducible como la maravilla.
Intraducible como la rebellion.
Intraducible como el enterior que respire.
Intraducible el deseo iluso,
el coloquuio de los ojos,
el salvajismo de tu canto,
como el gemido del halcón,
los murmullos de la selva,
como tus sombras que no se callan
y de tu carne, barro,
florecen luego hierbas.
Intraducible como los remolinos
que recogen tu cuerpo,
como la ausencia de no ser,
de las palabras que lo hacen.
Como el deasmor, intraducible,
la falta de copulación,
el sabor del sexo,
el entendimiento del crear
y su presencia.
Intraducible como el laberinto peculiar
de la vida y de la muerte,
como los átomos del Yo
que se dilyyen y reconfirguran,
como ecos de identidades disipadas,
como las olas de los mares que se confunden,
como el sentimiento y los brotes
que te eluden,
aunque supongas haberlos atrapado.
Intraducible como el perfume del suspiro,
el graznido de un latido oscuro,
el recinto de la voz indescrifable,
el aire negro.
El sol se me acerca,
al retroceder del día,
por el otro lado de mi ventana,
con el resplandor de su sonrisa
y en las hojas de la magnolia
me Saluda. Intraducible.
Inútil, pero irresistible,
es el querer traducer,
aunque tú, yo, nosotros
nos reblemos, escapemos
y creamos no ser nada de eso.
Untranslatable
I too am not a bit tamed, I too am untranslatable.—Walt Whitman
Untranslatable like wonder.
Untranslatable like rebellion.
Untranslatable like the inner place that breathes.
Untranslatable the deluded yearning,
the colloquy of eyes,
the savagery of your song,
like the falcon’s cry,
forest’s buzz’d whispers,
like your un-silenced shadows
and from your body, your clay,
grass later flourishes.
Untranslatable like the whirlwinds
that upraise your body,
like the absence called non-being,
the words that make it.
Like indifference, untranslatable,
lack of intercourse,
the experience of sex,
understanding the creative act
and its presence.
Untranslatable like the peculiar labyrinth
of life and death,
like the atoms of the Self
which dilute and reconfigure themselves,
like echoes of diffused identities,
like waves of commingled seas,
like sentiments and sprouts
that elude you,
though you fancy having caught them.
Untranslatable like the sigh’s perfume,
like the yowl of a dark throbbing,
the enclosure of an impenetrable voice,
black air.
At the fading of day
the sun approaches me,
on the other side of my window,
with the radiance of a smile
and greets me from the magnolia’s
leaves. Untranslatable.
Useless, but irresistible,
is the desire to translate,
even if you, I, we
rebel, escape, and believe
that those things are not the Me myself.
Reprinted from Todos somos Whitman/We Are All Whitman by Luis Alberto Ambroggio, translated by Brett Alan Sanders, Arte Público Press, 2016.
Walt Whitman (May 31, 1819 – March 26, 1892) lived in DC for ten years, from 1863 to 1873. He is the author of Leaves of Grass, a volume of poems he re-edited and re-published numerous times from 1855 to 1891, as well as Drum Beats, Memoranda During the War, and Specimen Days. None of his boarding house residences still stand, but a bust of him graces the front desk of the Manuscript Reading Room at the Library of Congress, and his words are included in several public art projects: at two Metro stations (Dupont Circle and Archives), at Washington Reagan National Airport, and at Freedom Plaza.
Luis Alberto Ambroggio is an internationally known Hispanic-American poet born in Argentina, and a member of the North American and the Spanish Academies of the Language. He is the author of twenty collections of poetry published in Argentina, Costa Rica, Spain, and the United States, including Difficult Beauty: Selected Poems 1987-2006 (2009), with an introduction by Pulitzer Prize winner Oscar Hijuelos, and The Wind's Archeology (2011). Ambroggio has also published two books of essays and a collection of short fiction, and co-edited the anthology Al pie de la Casa Blanca: Poetas hispanos de Washington, DC (At The Foot of the White House: Hispanic Poets in Washington, DC; 2010) and edited De Azul a Rojo: Voces de poetas nicaragüenses del siglo xxi (From Blue to Red: Voices of Nicaraguan Poets from the 21st Century; 2011). His poetry is translated into several languages, and is included in the Archives of Hispanic Literature of the Library of Congress. To read more by this author: Three poems, Vol. 6:2, Spring 2005 Wartime Issue, Vol. 7:2, Spring 2006 Langston Hughes Tribute Issue, Vol. 12:1, Winter 2011