F. García Lorca, “Wounds of Love”
 

Tetrameter (Second) Version


This light, this hungry flame that devours.
This landscape: a gray, encircling ocean.
This sorrow for a single notion.
These anguished skies, this world, these hours.

These tears of blood that decorate
the unplucked lyre, the torch impure.
This crush of waves I must endure.
My heart that houses the scorpion’s hate.

They’re wreaths of love, a bed for the hurt,
sleepless, I dream of your cherished presence
in ruins of my shipwrecked heart.

And though I seek the highest sense,
your heart gives me a valley fraught
with hemlock and bitter experience.
————————
Edits:
S1L1: This light, this fire that devours, > This light, this hungry flame that devours.
S1L2: this gray landscape encircling, > this gray landscape, like a circling ocean, > This landscape, a gray, encircling ocean. > This landscape: a gray, encircling ocean.
S1L3: this sorrow for just one inkling, > this grief for just one single notion,> this sorrow for a single notion, > This sorrow for a single notion.
S1L4: these anguished skies, these worldly hours, > these anguished skies, this world, these hours, > These anguished skies, this world, these hours.
S2L1: these tears of blood that ornament > these tears of blood obscenely gild > These tears of blood obscenely gild > These tears of blood obscenely paint > These tears of blood that decorate
S2L2: the lyre unplucked, the torch, profane, > the unplucked lyre, the torch, profane; > the unplucked lyre, the torch, profane. > the unplucked lyre, the torch profane.> the unplucked lyre, the torch impure.
S2L3: this crush of waves inflicts such pain; > This crush of waves inflicts such pain. > This crush of waves that brings such pain. > This crush of waves that brings me pain. > This crush of waves I must endure.
S2L4: the scorpion taints my sentiment. > the scorpion’s taint my heart has filled. > My heart with scorpion’s taint is filled. > My heart is filled with scorpion’s taint. > My heart that hosts the scorpion’s hate.> My heart that bears the scorpion’s hate. > My heart that houses the scorpion’s hate.
S3L1: They’re earths of love, for the hurt, a cot, > They’re wreaths of love, a bed for the hurt,
S3L2: where sleepless, I dream of you, intense, > where sleepless, I dream your cherished presence, > Awake, I dream your cherished presence > I dream, awake, your cherished presence > sleepless, I dream of your cherished presence
S3L3: in the wreckage of my sad heart. > in wreckage of my downcast heart. > in wreckage of my shipwrecked heart. > in the ruins of my shipwrecked heart.
S4L3: with hemlock and fervid prescience. > with hemlock and bitter prescience. > with lock and bitter experience.

————————

Pentameter (First) Version


This light, this hungry fire that can devour,
this gray landscape, threatening to surround me,
this one, overwhelming idea, trying to drown me,
this anguish in the heavens, the world, the hour,

this weeping of blood that decorates the lyre,
as yet unplucked, the torch that would excite me,
this heaviness that strikes me from the sea,
this scorpion that has made my heart its bower:

they are garlands of love, for the wounded, a cot,
where sleepless, I dream of your beloved presence
among the ruins of my shipwrecked heart.

And though I seek the highest form of prudence,
your heart gives me a valley that is fraught
with hemlock and the passion of bitter prescience.

————————
Edits:
S2L2:as yet unplucked, the torch that would arouse me, > as yet unplucked, the torch that would excite me,

————————
Original (from Ciudad Seva, casa digital del escritor Luis López Nieves)


Esta luz, este fuego que devora.
Este paisaje gris que me rodea.
Este dolor por una sola idea.
Esta angustia de cielo, mundo y hora.

Este llanto de sangre que decora
lira sin pulso ya, lúbrica tea.
Este peso del mar que me golpea.
Este alacrán que por mi pecho mora.

Son guirnaldas de amor, cama de herido,
donde sin sueño, sueño tu presencia
entre las ruinas de mi pecho hundido.

Y aunque busco la cumbre de prudencia
me da tu corazón valle tendido
con cicuta y pasión de amarga ciencia.

————————
Crib:


This light, this fire that devours.
This gray landscape that surrounds me.
This pain/sorrow for one single idea.
This anguish of the sky, the world, and hour/time.

This weeping of blood that decorates
the lyre still without plucking, the lusty torch.
This weight of the sea that strikes me.
This scorpion that dwells in my breast.

They are garlands of love, a bed for the wounded
where, without sleeping/dreaming, I dream [of] your presence
among the ruins of my sunken/downcast/submerged heart.

And although I seek the summit of prudence,
your heart gives me a valley lying
with hemlock and the passion/fervor/heat of bitter knowledge.

Hi, Glenn. I’m intrigued, but a little under the weather, so maybe Mignon or someone else will stop by while I’m recuperating. Meanwhile, I’m going make a suggestion that others have made to me: There seems to be a lot of metrical filler in the translation. I wonder if you’d consider letting out some of the air and shrinking all or some of the lines to tet. It may not be doable, but on a few occasions I found it surprisingly easy and effective.

Ok, a little more while I’m at it: I didn’t understand “the torch that would arouse me” until I peeked at the crib. I thought the torch might be arousing him from sleep. I’m a legendary misreader, of course, but keep in mind the potential ambiguity. Also in S1, “fire that can devour” and threatens to surround is more tentative than fire that does devour and does surround. And an “idea trying to drown me” seems a little far removed from “pain for an idea,” though it does tie in with the shipwreck. These are all things you could consider if you play with the line lengths. I think I’m running a fever, so I hope I’m not subjecting you to feverish ravings …

This is my thought too, Glenn. More will follow, hopefully. (A selection of Lorca's poems is on my bedside cabinet at the moment, and part of my bedtime reading, so I'm kind of in the zone.)

Cheers

David

Okay, Carl and David—

Challenge accepted! I chopped a foot off each line. You’re right, Carl, that it was easier than I expected it to be. I guess that shows that there was twenty percent inert ingredients in the original pentameter version, but I still like the first version better.

I hope this gives you something to play with as you recuperate, Carl.

Glenn

Well done, Glenn. The compression of your new version seems more in keeping with the original. A few more thoughts:

S1L2: How are you scanning this line? I get three stresses. A line or two of trimeter or pentameter in a tet poem wouldn’t necessarily bother me, but I wondered what you had in mind.

S1L3: I can squeeze four stresses out of this line by promoting “for” and ending the line with a trochaic substitution, but three seems a lot more natural to me. And how do you understand the line? In your first version, Lorca had some obsessive idea that was giving him pain. Now it sounds like he’s longing for an inkling of something.

S1L4: Wouldn’t “this anguished sky and world and hour” be more accurate?

S2L2: You could undo the inversion for a more natural “unplucked lyre.” “Profane” seems rather cerebral for this passionate poem. How about “the torch of lust”? Maybe you could rhyme it somehow with “crush.”

S2L4: “Taints my sentiment” pales beside “dwells in my breast.”

S3L3: Headless line? That’s problematic when the initial syllable isn’t naturally stressed. This one’s going to be read as anapest-anapest-spondee.

Thanks, Carl! Very helpful suggestions.
Glenn

Oh dear, I was afraid of that. You’ll probably find Sphereans who are fine with it, but you can count me out.

Now that I never saw coming. It could come in handy if you need to rhyme “single fish” with “Eng-gle-ish.

I wouldn’t dream of spoiling your iambs. I was saying “UNplucked,” which, strange as it seems, is possible. In isolation, the adjective is indisputably “unPLUCKED,” but before a noun, the stress can shift to avoid two adjacent stresses. Are you more likely to say “an unWED MOTHer” or “an UNwed MOTHer”? I can find you a better explanation of this if you’re interested.

Mea culpa.

Hi, Carl—

You made me feel so guilty about cheating the meter that I went back and made some of the changes you suggested. I like the chiasmus in S2L2, but I’m sure you’ll ding me for the inversion in S2L4. The original uses only four rhymes in an ABBA ABBA CDCDCD scheme. I managed to preserve that in the pentameter version, but couldn’t pull it off in the tet.

I hope these edits cheer you up and speed your quick recovery.
Glenn

Ok, great. A few more thoughts:

this gray landscape like a circling ocean,

An ocean is a big thing to add in translation, but it works pretty well as a last resort, I think.

this grief for just one single notion,

“This sorrow for a single notion” would be pretty, but you have to decide what best conveys the original.

these anguished skies, this world, these hours,

I thought “anguished” modified skies, world and hours. That’s why I suggested something like “these anguished skies and world and hours.”

these tears of blood obscenely gild
the unplucked lyre, the torch, profane;
this crush of waves inflicts such pain;
this scorpion’s taint my heart has filled.

You’re right. I am turned off by the inversion, and I don’t know how tears of blood could turn anything gold anyway. With “obscenely,” you seem to have taken the lustiness from the torch and given it to the tears of blood, which is also a little dubious.

Oh, Carl, you are so strict! (This is a callback to the movie The Twelve Chairs based on a novel by Ilf and Petrov.)

I like your simplification of S1L3, and will use it.

Shakespeare had Lady Macbeth use “gilt” to refer to smearing Duncan’s blood on his bodyguards: “I’ll gild the faces of the grooms withal,/ For it must seem their guilt.” (Macbeth II, ii, 69-70).

In the original Spanish, the anguish could be construed as belonging to the sky, world, and hour, or just to the sky. The sexual innuendo attached to the torch is complex. “Lúbrica” means “sexually arousing, obscene” (as is seen in the etymology of the English word “lubricious”) but it can also mean “slippery” (as is seen in the etymology of the English word “lubricate.”). I concluded that the torch (yes, Dr. Freud, I know that sometimes a torch is just a torch) is slippery with the tears of blood, and thus is sexually suggestive somehow to the speaker. Thus the tears of blood are the source of the lustiness. Consequently I could justify lúbrica modifying tea as a transferred epithet (hypallage) which I untransferred in the tet translation.

I’ll have to keep thinking to come up with a fix for the inversion in S2L4.
Thanks for your continued guidance!
Glenn

I like the new version, but not the inversion. (See what I did there?)

I also don't much like the closing rhyme on "prescience". Is that meaning in the original? I can't tell myself, but it just looks like "science" to me.

On the whole, though, the tet version works much better for me.

Cheers

David

Thanks, David—

I’m still waiting to be struck with inspiration for a way to fix the inversion in S2L4. I think it will probably involve a re-do of the whole quatrain.

García Lorca’s choice of the word ciencia to end his sonnet is significant. The most common Spanish words for “knowledge” are conocimiento or saber. The word ciencia, while not unusual, also means “science,” and carries a connotation of being the kind of knowledge that is useful for making predictions. I thought “prescience” most nearly approximated this nuance. Of course, García Lorca’s word choice is also constrained by rhyme considerations, as is mine.

I liked the pentameter version better, but the tet version is growing on me. It was something I would not have thought to try without you and Carl suggesting it.

It was actually David and Andrew Frisardi who ganged up on me and made me shrink one of my translations from pentameter to tetrameter. It worked wonders. Of course, English is a much more compact language than Russian. The difference with Spanish may not be so great.

Hi Glenn,

Good to read this. I like the tet version more, it's just so much tighter, and seems to better fit the tautness of the original. I started commenting on the tet version, but I've run out of time. I'll try to come back for the sestet another day.

A general comment: I'd try keeping the original punctuation as much as possible. You've changed the full stops to commas and semicolons. I'd keep the sentence fragments of the orginal. It's more terse, more clipped. The mood changes a little with the commas. It softens things a touch, smooths the edginess a little.

I'd say S1L1 is trimeter, or at least ambiguous. "fire" is one syllable, albeit for a diphong -- a more pronounced diphtong for some speakers than others. You might get away with it later in the poem, but as a first line, before the metre's established, I'm less sure. You could put the "hungry" back in, I guess:

This LIGHT, this HUNGry FIRE that deEVOURS,

I guess some might want to read it as pentameter. But if that worries you, you could go with "flame" maybe?

I like the ocean image, whether it's in the original or not, and it gibes with the later "sea". But, for it to work, I do think the ocean needs to be "encircling" to be surrounding the N. Currently it's just circling: moving in circles, revolving. Though to fit "encircling" in, as the line stands, you'd need to lose "grey".

S2L1, I think you need a "that" to keep the sense and the grammar (this is a sentence fragment in the original and without the "that" you lose the fragment and have an active verb). You don't lose the metre by inserting one.

"this crush of waves inflicts such pain"

again, you switch to a sentence where the original has a fragment. Maybe go with:

this crush of waves that inflicts pain;

in the comments I saw you express disatisfiaction with a phyrric foot followed by a spondee, and since that's what I'm suggesting here, so I'll just point out that such a combination is known as a double iamb. A classic metrical move that's been kosher since old Shaky himself.

"this scorpion’s taint my heart has filled"

This seems to say that his heart has filled the scorpion's taint. Whereas in the original it seems to be the other way round: the scorpian has made a nest in his heart.

So shouldn't it be: "My heart the scorpian's taint has filled"?

I'd say neither of these versions in an inversion, because, again, this is a sentence fragment. There's no active verb. There's an implied "that" in each:

The scorpian's taint that my heart has filled

My heart that the scorpian's taint has filled


best,

Matt

Hi, Matt—

Wow! This was the thunderbolt of inspiration I was hoping for. I incorporated many of your suggestions and feel that they greatly improved the tet version to the extent that I now prefer it to the pentameter version. Your advice to return to García Lorca’s punctuation was inspired. My English teacher compulsion to correct sentence fragments was getting the better of me. The periods slow the tempo and help each image to shine. Your point about the scorpion line was also a revelation. I was able to get rid of the inversion, clarify the image, and get rid of the “gild” that was annoying Carl.

I decided to expand the ocean imagery, even though it moves the translation away from literal toward adaptation. It all hangs on one reference to the ocean in S2L3, but I added the gray ocean in S1L2 and the shipwreck in S3L3. I decided that a gray seascape was more desolate than any gray landscape I could imagine, and I like the image of the “shipwrecked heart” even though it stretches the meaning of hundido almost to the breaking point.

Thanks so much for your inspired help. Thanks, too, to Carl and David. All three of you constant readers have taught me a great deal as I do my apprenticeship as a translator.
Glenn

Matt’s an ace, isn’t he? The translation is really looking good, with two reservations:

I’m glad you recovered the “shipwreck,” which you blamed me for losing, but now there’s a wreck too many in that line. Can’t we find something to replace “wreckage”?

I’m afraid I may have misled you. Do I understand you to be saying that the tears of blood paint the lyre and the torch? If so, forget everything I said yesterday and make it: “the lyre unplucked, the torch profane.” Without the parallelism, it’s unclear grammatically what “the torch, profane,” especially with a comma, is doing. Sorry for the confusion.

Hi Glenn,

I like the switching of "grey" from landscape to ocean, a clever solution that keeps the image, and I'd say even improves it. It's still clear that the landscape is grey.

Very happy my thoughts were helpful. In which case, I'm encouraged to double down on them a bit. I notice that your second stanza is still made of fully formed sentences, whereas Lorca's continues the fragments of the previous S. So, my suggestion would be that since you can follow Lorca on this, you should.

Here's your second stanza as fragments, with none of your word choices changed, just the occasional "that" added.

These tears of blood that obscenely paint
the unplucked lyre, the torch profane.
This crush of waves that inflicts such pain.
My heart that's filled with scorpian's taint.

It's all still loose iambic tetrameter, though you have the option of tightening that in places if you like.

In relation to this, I'll throw out a suggestion for L4. Because the scorpion has made its home in the N's heart, you could use "hosts", which also adds alliteration, and is a little less expected than "fills", since we often say hearts are "full" of something. So:

My heart that hosts the scorpion’s taint.
(or "a scorpian's")

L1: Should you wish, you now have the option of replacing "obscenely" with a two-syllable word. "darkly", "crudely", "quickly"? ("splatter-paints" would accurate, given that these are tears dropping, but too comical I think!). Trouble here is you're having to invent an adjective, as you do with "obscenely", because "paint" already fully covers "decorate". I wonder if there's a way to keep "decorate"? For example:

My heart that hosts a scorpion’s hate.
(or "that's filled with a scorpian's hate)

Though that maybe overlays the image with interpretation, or:

My heart that holds [bears] a scorpian's weight

Though maybe that's a little off, sense-wise.

Any just throwing out some thoughts. I also looked for rhymes with "nest" and "lair", but can find anything that would work as a subsitute for "decorate".

I hope to get to that sestet eventually!

best,

Matt

More great ideas! I like returning to “decorate” and the original sentence fragments. I’m not thrilled with “scorpion’s hate” because in the next line the speaker is declaring his love, but it will do until I can find something better. Thanks so much for your help, Matt.

P.S. I changed “hosts” in S2L4 yo “bears.” That way the speaker is the victim rather than the perpetrator of the hate.

This is now reading so well! Two thoughts:

This landscape, a gray, encircling ocean.

Without “like,” this is going to be read as two things: landscape and ocean. A colon would clarify it.

How about replacing the fillerish “such” with “me”?

Sorry, Glenn, I'm like a dog with a bone, but I'm going to come back to that ciencia. I checked my Penguin Selected Poems, and the poem is in there, and the translation used there is "wisdom".

This seems better, in its sense, to me, but of course nothing rhymes with "wisdom". And therein lies the problem. (The Penguin translator did not attempt a rhymed version of it.)

Good to see you striving towards the light, though. I think you're getting there.

Cheers

David

Good suggestions, Carl. I’m using both of them.

Yes, David, “wisdom” is like “orange” and “silver” in having no rhyme (except, perhaps, “is dumb,” which I cannot see a way to use.)

Thanks, gentlemen.

I agree with David that "prescience" is the wrong word. Though "ciencia" has a range of meanings, none of them include the ability to see the future. After reading several definitions (in Spanish language dictionaries), I would say that "experience" is an alternative to consider, though not an exact translation. Ciencia can mean "knowledge" or wisdom, but if you want to keep the same slant/sight rhymes, experience seems very much in the ballpark.

[Never mind]

That’s a great idea, Roger. Thanks!

I wonder why you replaced “sleepless” with “awake.” Seems to me either of these would sound better:

Sleepless, I dream your cherished presence
Waking, I dream your cherished presence

At first I wasn't sure that being a host to the scorpion's hate means that that it's the N's hate, but thinking more about it, I think I do see what you mean. I guess it can be read that he hates with the hate of a scorpion.

I wonder about "bears", though, because it also means "endures", and then sentence means something like, "the scorpion hates me and I endure that hate". And then there's no sense of the scorpions nest being located in the heart.

Do you mean "bears" in the sense of "to hold / to carry" that intend here? In which case, maybe use "holds"? It alliterates nicely with "hate".

My heart that holds the scorpions hate

Then again, I guess "holds" (or to "bears" in the sense of holding) also be read as it being the N's hate?

Hmm.

Matt

I put “sleepless” back, Carl, since that’s the literal meaning of sin sueño.

I changed “bears” to “houses” in S2L4, Matt. This clarifies whose hate we are discussing (the scorpion’s), and picks up the alliteration.

Thanks, fellows!

Hi, Glenn. I can’t get this translation out of my head. The one thing that still bugs me is “hate”—too specific for a scorpion that could represent so many emotions. How about something like this?

These tears of blood embellishing
the unplucked lyre, the torch impure.
This crush of waves I must endure.
This scorpion in my breast—its sting.

“Sting” extends the metaphor without adding anything consequential, and it allows you to recover the parallelism of “This scorpion.”

Best I could come up with.

Hi Glenn,

Finally back for the sestet. I think my main issue is this line:

They’re wreaths of love, for the hurt, a cot,

it strikes me as awkwardly phrased. Why not just reverse it:

They’re wreaths of love, a bed for the hurt,

which seems more natural to me, and rhyme-wise, I'd say you're still fine. You get hurt/heart/fraught, which seems to work just as well as cot/heart/fraught -- better, even.

A possible downside of "hurt" is that it can mean both "wound" and "wounded". So, the hurt as "the pain", and the hurt as "the wounded", and the original has only the latter sense (or the crib does anyway). But I don't know that is that much of a problem. And reordered as above, I think the latter sense maybe comes across stronger.

best,

Matt

I second Matt’s suggestion. Smoother, clearer, and the rhyme’s as good.

Hi, Matt and Carl—

Your suggestions are great! I made the adjustments. I am new at translation, and really appreciate the opportunity to do an apprenticeship with you. I have learned a great deal from working with you both. Thanks for your investment of time and talent.

Glenn