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Faith in Life
(English translation of 'Fe de Vida' by Antonio Colinas)
Stay close by the sea in which ideas were born
and be empty of ideas. (And so have them all.)
Be only the breeze at the top of the huge pine-tree,
the scent of orange blossom, the night of orchids
in forgotten coves.
Just stay watching the bird that passes by
and does not return; stay
waiting for the yellow sky
that burns and is freshened by the flashes of lightning
that leap from island to island.
Or contemplate the white cloud
that, being nothing, appears content.
Stay floating and rocking to and fro,
on top of the waves that pass,
like a lost oar.
Or follow, as dolphins do,
the direction of predetermined time.
Be like the moment when ships on January nights
fall asleep between daffodils and lighthouses.
Leave me here, not with the light of knowledge
(that was born and raised in this sea)
but simply with the light of this sea.
Or with its many lights:
those of burning gold and those of cold green.
Or with the light of all the blues.
But. above all, leave me with the white light,
the one that burns and vanquishes over damaged men,
and days of stress and ideas like knives.
Leave me to be like an olive tree or a pool of water.
So that someone could hold me in their palm
like a handful of salt.
Or of light.
Close your eyes in the silence of scent
so that your heart – at last! - can see.
Close your eyes so that love will grow in me.
Leave me to share the silence
and solitude of verandas,
the hospitality of open doors; leave me
with the full moon of nightingales in June
watching over the trembling water in the last remaining springs.
Allow me the freedom that is lost
on the lips of a woman.
For more translations of poems by Antonio Colinas, go to Translations. |
