I am pleased to have taken on
so many obligations--in my life
most curious elements accumulated:
gentle ghosts which undid me,
an insistent mineral labor,
an inexplicable wind which ruffled me,
the stab of some wounding kisses, the hard reality
of my brothers,
my insistent need to be always watchful,
my impulse to be myself, only myself
in the weakness of self-pleasuring.
That is why--water on stone--my life was always
singing its way between joy and obligation.
* * *
Sumario
Estoy contento con tantos deberes
que me impuse, en mi vida
se amasaron extranos materiales:
tiernos fantasmas que me despeinaban
categoricas manos minerales,
un viento sin razon que me agitaba
la espina de unos besos lacerantes, la dura realidad
de mis hermanos
mi deber imperioso de vigia,
mi inclinacion a ser solo yo mismo
en la debilidad de mis placeres
por eso--agua en la piedra--fue mi vida
cantando entre la dicha y la dureza
Pablo Neruda, Fully
Empowered
(Translated by Alastair Reid)
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