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Little Infinite Poem
To take the wrong road
is to arrive at the snow
and arriving at the snow
is to graze for several centuries on the grass of cemeteries.
To take the wrong road
is to arrive at the woman,
the woman who doesn’t fear the light,
the woman who kills two roosters in a second,
the light that doesn’t fear the roosters
and roosters that don't know how to sing across the snow.
But if the snow chooses the wrong heart,
the South Wind may arrive
and as the air pays no heed to groans
we’ll have to graze again on the grass of cemeteries.
I saw two saddened, waxen ears of wheat
that buried a landscape of volcanoes
and I saw two mad boys
weeping as they pressed the pupils in a murderer’s eyes.
But two has never been a number
because it is anguish and its shadow
it's the guitar where love is driven to despair
it's the proof of an infinity not its own
and it’s the walls of the dead
and the punishment of the new, unending resurrection.
The dead hate the number two,
but the number two lulls women to sleep,
and as woman fears the light,
light trembles before the roosters
and as roosters know only how to fly across the snow,
we’ll have to graze on the grass of cemeteries forever.
English translation by Paul Archer of Lorca's Pequeño poema infinito.
For more translations of poems by Lorca, go to Translations.
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