The Loved One Sleeps on the Breast of the Poet

After Federico García Lorca — El amor duerme en el pecho del poeta

You’ll never understand the love for you I feel,
long-slumbering boy, as on my breast you lie.
I’ll hide you while I weep. The lynch-mob in full cry
has voices harsh as violating steel.

Mob rule provokes the stars to tremble and my flesh to quake.
Its rage is with us in the room. It hurts me in the chest.
Bird in my hand, with shouts and threats they’ve tracked us to our nest.
The wings of your proud spirit will be bitten when you wake.

They’re out there, through the window, jostling in Gethsemane.
Your body and my torment are the sights they’ve come to see.
They ride white horses with green manes.

Sleep on, beloved. Do you hear? My blood maintains
a kind of broken rhythm underneath rough music from the violins.
They lie in wait, the violators. Soon the agony begins.

Listen to this poem — read by Peter Hetherington

El amor duerme en el pecho del poeta — Federico García Lorca

Tú nunca entenderás lo que te quiero
porque duermes en mí y estás dormido.
Yo te oculto llorando, perseguido
por una voz de penetrante acero.

Norma que agita igual carne y lucero
traspasa ya mi pecho dolorido
y las turbias palabras han mordido
las alas de tu espíritu severo.

Grupo de gente salta en los jardines
esperando tu cuerpo y mi agonía
en caballos de luz y verdes crines.

Pero sigue durmiendo, vida mía.
¡Oye mi sangre rota en los violines!
¡Mira que nos acechan todavía!

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