Dogs and generals

This entry is part 2 of 5 in the series Honduran poetry

 

Roberto Sosa is Honduras’ most famous living poet. See Los Pobres, up today at Moving Poems, for another of his poems I’ve translated (as well as for an explanation of why I’m so upset by yesterday’s coup in Honduras).
__________

LAS SALES ENIGMATICAS
Roberto Sosa

Los Generales compran, interpretan y reparten
la palabra y el silencio.

Son rígidos y firmes
como las negras alturas pavorosas. Sus mansiones
ocupan
dos terceras partes de sangre y una de soledad,
y desde allí, sin hacer movimientos, gobiernan
los hilos
anudados a sensibilísimos mastines
con dentaduras de oro y humana apariencia, y combinan,
nadie lo ignora, las sales enigmáticas
de la orden superior, mientras se hinchan
sus inaudibles anillos poderosos.
Los Generales son dueños y señores
de códigos, vidas y haciendas, y miembros respetados
de la Santa Iglesia Católica, Apostólica y Romana.
__________

HIDDEN CHARMS
tr. by Dave Bonta

The Generals purchase, interpret and allocate
words and silences.

They are as rigid and unyielding
as fearsome black crags. Their mansions
take up
two parts blood and one part solitude,
whence, without moving a muscle, they pull
the strings
tied to highly trained mastiffs
with gold teeth and a human likeness, and they combine —
as everyone knows — hidden charms
of the highest order, while their powerful
noiseless rings swell up.

The Generals are lords and masters
of the law, of lives and estates, and they’re members
in good standing of the Holy Catholic Church, Roman and Apostolic.
__________

Here’s another Honduran poem expanding on the “mastiffs” theme, from Oscar Acosta’s 1957 volume Poesía Menor.
__________

LOS PERROS
Oscar Acosta

Miran desde su lengua el silencio del amor.
Se quedan quietos en los rincones, huelen
el cariño en las ropas, en las lámparas, en la voz.
Caminan suaves sobre las alfombras verdes.
Los ojos son vivos y hablan por sí solos.
Cómo ausentarlos entonces al silencio,
cómo echarlos de las calles, cómo sepultarlos
si se levantan de los jardines floridos,
cómo envenenarlos por una disposición sanitaria
si sus amos cordiales están también rabiosos.
__________

DOGS
tr. by Dave Bonta

See how the silence of love drips from their tongues.
They keep quiet in corners, catching the scent
of affection on clothing, on lamps, in the voice.
They walk softly over green carpets. Their eyes
are so animated they speak all by themselves.
How then to silence them? How to kick them
off the streets? How to bury them when
they keep rising from flowerbeds?
How to poison and safely dispose of them
if their loving masters have also gone rabid?
__________

I’ll be sharing translations of Honduran poetry here all this week.

Series Navigation← NightMothers and heroes →

OTHER POSTS IN THE SERIES

7 Replies to “Dogs and generals”

    1. Yes. And as it happens, Mark and Luz’s daughter Eva is here for the summer with her grandparents. She spent last summer and fall in Honduras, attending school and perfecting her Spanish, and her other grandparents are there. Another good friend of mine has worked extensively with Honduran campesinos. So suffice it to say we’re all watching the situation with great concern.

      1. Thanks for the Honduran poems! They are awesome. I know quite a bit about US and British poetry, but not much about Honduran poems. My fiance is Honduran and I’m looking for a Honduran poem to read in our wedding. Any good ideas?

        1. Glad you liked these. Roberto Sosa has some love poems in Máscara Suelta, translated by Jo Anne Englebert in The Common Grief (Curbstone Press, 1994). I’m thinking in particular of the poem that closes the book, “El más antiguo de los nombres de fuego” — “The Most Ancient of the Names of Fire.” That might work very well. Here is the Spanish:

          EL MÁS ANTIGUO DE LOS NOMBRES DEL FUEGO

          Dichosos los amantes por que les pertenece
          el grano de arena
          que sostiene el peso del centro de los mares.

          Hipnotizados por los juegos de agua
          no oyen
          sino la música que sus nombres esparce.

          Unidos,
          pegándose entre sí como los animalitos aterrados
          que presienten que van a morir, tiemblan sus partes.

          Nada les es ajeno.

          Para ellos contra viento y marea
          sólo tienen sentido las embellecedoras palabras
          de todo lo que existe:–te amo, juntos hacia el final
          llegaremos a viejos.

          Los cuervos y las cuervas les sacarán los ojos,
          los bellos gestos, incluso la luna del espejo,
          pero no el fuego,
          de donde surgirán de nuevo los amantes.

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