Also by Pablo Neruda from New Directions
THE CAPTAIN’S VERSES
RESIDENCE ON EARTH
CONTENTS
PREFACE:
“My Book on Spain” by Pablo Neruda
ESPAÑA EN EL CORAZON
SPAIN IN OUR HEARTS
Invocación / Invocation
Bombardeo / Bombardment
Maldición / Curse
España pobre por culpa de los ricos / Spain Poor Through the Fault of the Rich
La tradición / Tradition
Madrid (1936) / Madrid (1936)
Explico algunas cosas / I Explain a Few Things
Canto a las madres de los milicianos muertos / Song for the Mothers of Slain Militiamen
Cómo era España / What Spain Was Like
Llegada a Madrid de La Brigada Internacional / Arrival in Madrid of the International Brigade
Batalla del río Jarama / Battle of the Jarama River
Almería / Almería
Tierras ofendidas / Offended Lands
Sanjurjo en los infiernos / Sanjurjo in Hell
Mola en los infiernos / Mola in Hell
El general Franco en los infiernos / General Franco in Hell
Canto sobre unas ruinas / Song about Some Ruins
La victoria de las armas del pueblo / The Victory of the Arms of the People
Los gremios en el frente / The Unions at the Front
Triunfo / Triumph
Paisaje después de una batalla / Landscape After a Battle
Antitanquistas / Antitankers
Madrid (1937) / Madrid (1937)
Oda solar al Ejército del Pueblo / Solar Ode to the Army of the People
PREFACE:
“My Book on Spain” by Pablo Neruda
Time passed. We were beginning to lose the war. The poets sided with the Spanish people: Federico had been murdered in Granada. Miguel Hernández had been transformed from a goatherd into a fighting word. In soldier’s uniform, he read his poems on the front lines. Manuel Altolaguirre kept his printing presses going. He set one up on the eastern front, near Gerona, in an old monastery. My book España en el corazón was printed there in a unique way. I believe few books, in the extraordinary history of so many books, have had such a curious birth and fate.
The soldiers at the front learned to set type. But there was no paper. They found an old mill and decided to make it there. A strange mixture was concocted, between one falling bomb and the next, in the middle of the fighting. They threw everything they could get their hands on into the mill, from an enemy flag to a Moorish soldier’s bloodstained tunic. And in spite of the unusual materials used and the total inexperience of its manufacturers, the paper turned out to be very beautiful. The few copies of that book still in existence produce astonishment at its typography and at its mysteriously manufactured pages. Years later I saw a copy in the Library of Congress in Washington, D.C., displayed in a showcase as one of the rarest books of our time.
My book had just been printed and bound when the Republic’s defeat was suddenly upon us. Hundreds of thousands of refugees glutted the roads leading out of Spain. It was the exodus, the most painful event in the history of that country.
Among those lines of people going into exile were the survivors of the eastern front, and with them Manuel Altolaguirre and the soldiers who had made the paper and printed España en el corazón. My book was the pride of these men who had worked to bring out my poetry in the face of death. I learned that many carried copies of the book in their sacks, instead of their own food and clothing. With those sacks over their shoulders, they set out on the long march to France.
The endless column walking to exile was bombed hundreds of times. Soldiers fell and the books were spilled on the highway. Others continued their interminable flight. On the other side of the border, the Spaniards who reached exile met with brutal treatment. The last copies of this impassioned book that was born and perished in the midst of fierce fighting were immolated in a bonfire.
Miguel Hernández sought refuge in the Chilean Embassy, which during the war had granted asylum to four thousand Franco followers. Carlos Morla Lynch, the ambassador, claimed to be his friend but denied the great poet his protection. A few days after, he was arrested and thrown into prison. He died of tuberculosis in jail three years later. The nightingale could not survive in captivity.
My consular duties had come to an end. Because I had taken part in the defense of the Spanish Republic, the Chilean government decided to remove me from my post.
from Neruda’s Memoirs (1974), translated by Hardie St. Martin
INVOCACIÓN
Para empezar, para sobre la rosa
pura y partida, para sobre el origen
de cielo y aire y tierra, la voluntad de un canto
con explosiones, el deseo
de un canto inmenso, de un metal que recoja
guerra y desnuda sangre.
España, cristal de copa, no diadema,
sí machacada piedra, combatida temura
de trigo, cuero y animal ardiendo.
Mañana, hoy, por tus pasos
un silencio, un asombro de esperanzas
como un aire mayor: una luz, una luna,
luna gastada, luna de mano en mano,
de campana en campana!
Madre natal, puño
de avena endurecida,
planeta
seco y sangriento de los héroes!
Quién? por caminos, quién,
quién, quién? en sombra, en sangre, quién?
en destello, quién,
INVOCATION
To begin, pause over the pure
and cleft rose, pause over the source
of sky and air and earth, the will of a song
with explosions, the desire
of an immense song, of a metal that will gather
war and naked blood.
Spain, water glass, not diadem,
but yes crushed stone, militant tenderness
of wheat, hide and burning animal.
Tomorrow, today, in your steps
a silence, an astonishment of hopes
like a major air: a light, a moon,
a worn-out moon, a moon from hand to hand,
from bell to bell!
Natal mother, fist
of hardened oats,
dry
and bloody planet of heroes!
Who? by roads, who,
in a flash, who,
BOMBARDEO
quién? Cae
ceniza cae,
hierro
y piedra y muerte y llanto y llamas,
quién, quién, madre mía, quién, adónde?
BOMBARDMENT
who? Ashes
fall, fall,
iron
and stone and death and weeping and flames,
who, who, mother, who, where?
MALDICIÓN
Patria surcada, juro que en tus cenizas
nacerás comoflor de agua perpetua,
juro que de tu boca de sed saldran al aire
los pétalos del pan, la derramada
espiga inaugurada. Malditos sean,
malditos, malditos los que con hacha y serpiente
llegaron a tu arena terrenal, malditos los
que esperaron este día para abrir la puerta
de la mansión al moro y al bandido:
Qué habéis logrado? Traed, traed la lámpara,
ved el suelo empapado, ved el huesito negro
comido por las llamas, la vestidura
de España fusilada.
CURSE
Furrowed motherland, I swear that in your ashes
you will be born like a
flower of eternal water,
I swear that from your mouth of thirst will come to the air
the petals of bread, the spilt
inaugurated flower. Cursed,
cursed, cursed be those who with ax and serpent
came to your earthly arena, cursed those
who waited for this day to open the door
of the dwelling to the Moor and the bandit:
What have you achieved? Bring, bring the lamp,
see the soaked earth, see the blackened little bone
eaten by the flames, the garment
of murdered Spain.
ESPAÑA POBRE POR CULPA DE LOS RICOS
Malditos los que un día
no miraron, malditos ciegos malditos,
los que no adelantaron a la solemne patria
el pan sino las lágrimas, malditos
uniformes manchados y sotanas
de agrios, hediondos perros de cueva y sepultura.
La pobreza era por España
como caballos llenos de humo,
como piedras caídas del
manantial de la desventura,
tierras cereales sin
abrir, bodegas secretas
de azul y estaño, ovarios, puertas, arcos
cerrados, profundidades
que querían parir, todo estaba guardado
por triangulares guardias con escopeta,
por curas de color de triste rata,
por lacayos del rey de inmenso culo.
España dura, país manzanar y pino,
te prohibian tus vagos señores:
A no sembrar, a no parir las minas,
a no montar las vacas, al ensimismamiento
de las tumbas, a visitar cada año
el monumento de Cristóbal el marinero, a relinchar
discursos con macacos venidos de América,
iguales en “posición social” y podredumbre.
No levantéis escuelas, no hagáis crujir la cáscara
terrestre con arados, no llenéis los graneros
de abundancia trigal: rezad, bestias, rezad,
que un dios de culo inmenso como el culo del rey
os espera: “Allí tomaréis sopa, hermanos míos.”
SPAIN POOR THROUGH THE FAULT OF THE RICH
Cursed be those who one day
did not look, cursed cursed blind,
those who offered the solemn fatherland
not bread but tears, cursed
sullied uniforms and cassocks
of sour, stinking dogs of cave and grave.
Poverty was throughout Spain
like horses filled with smoke,
like stones fallen from the
grainlands still
unopened, secret storehouses
of blue and tin, ovaries, doors, closed
arches, depths
that tried to give birth, all was guarded
by triangular guards with guns,
by sad-rat-colored priests,
by lackeys of the huge-rumped king.
Tough Spain, land of apple orchards and pines,
your idle lords ordered you:
Do not sow the land, do not give birth to mines,
do not breed cows, but contemplate
the tombs, visit each year
the monument of Columbus the sailor, neigh
speeches with monkeys come from America,
equal in “social position” and in putrefaction.
Do not build schools, do not break open earth’s
crust with plows, do not fill the granaries
with abundance of wheat: pray, beasts, pray,
for a god with a rump as huge as the king’s rump
awaits you: “There you will have soup, my brethren.”
LA TRADICIÓN
En las noches de España, por los viejos jardines
la tradición, llena de mocos muertos,
chorreando pus y peste se paseaba
con una cola en bruma, fantasmal y fantástica,
vestida de asma y huecos levitones sangrientos,
y su rostro de ojos profundos detenidos
eran verdes babosas comiendo tumba,
y su boca sin muelas mordía cada noche
la espiga sin nacer, el mineral secreto,
y pasaba con su corona de cardos verdes
sembrando vagos huesos de difunto y puñales.
TRADITION
In the nights of Spain, through the old gardens,
tradition, covered with dead snot,
spouting pus and pestilence, strolled
with its tail in the fog, ghostly and fantastic,
dressed in asthma and bloody hollow frock coats,
and its face with sunken staring eyes
was green slugs eating graves,
and its toothless mouth each night bit
the unborn flower, the secret mineral,
and it passed with its crown of green thistles
sowing vague deadmen’s bones and daggers.
MADRID (1936)
Madrid sola y solemne, julio te sorprendió con tu alegría
de panal pobre: clara era tu calle,
claro era tu sueño.
Un hipo negro
de generates, una ola
de sotanas rabiosas
rompió entre tus rodillas
sus cenegales aguas, sus ríos de gargajo.
Con los ojos heridos todavía de sueño,
con escopeta y piedras, Madrid, recién herida,
te defendiste. Corrías
por las calles
dejando estelas de tu santa sangre,
reuniendo y llamando con una voz de océano,
con un rostro cambiado para siempre
por la luz de la sangre, como una vengadora
montaña, como una silbante
estrella de cuchillos.
Cuando en los tenebrosos cuarteles, cuando en las sacristías
de la traición entró tu espada ardiendo,
no hubo sino silencio de amanecer, no hubo
sino tu paso de banderas,
y una honorable gota de sangre en tu sonrisa.
MADRID (1936)
Madrid, alone and solemn, July surprised you with your joy
of humble honeycomb: bright was your street,
bright was your dream.
A black vomit
of generals, a wave
of rabid cassocks
poured between your knees
their swampy waters, their rivers of spittle.
With eyes still wounded by sleep,
with guns and stones, Madrid newly wounded
you defended yourself. You ran
though the streets
leaving trails of your holy blood
rallying and calling with an oceanic voice,
with a face changed forever
by the light of blood, like an avenging
mountain, like a whistling
star of knives.
When into the dark barracks, when into the sacristies
of treason your burning sword entered
there was only silence of dawn, there was
only your passage of flags,
and an honorable drop of blood in your smile.
EXPLICO ALGUNAS COSAS
Preguntaréis: Y dónde están las lilas?
Y la metafísica cubierta de amapolas?
Y la lluvia que a menudo golpeaba
sus palabras llenándolas
de agujeros y pájaros?
Os voy a contar todo lo que me pasa.
Yo viváa en un barrio
de Madrid, con campanas,
con reloies. con árboles.
Desde allí se veía
el rostro seco de Castilla
como un océano de cuero.
Mi casa era llamada
la casa de las flores, porque por todas partes
estallaban geranios: era
una bella casa
con perros y chiquillos.
Raúl, te acuerdas?
Te acuerdas, Rafael?
Federico, te acuerdas
debajo de la tierra,
te acuerdas de mi casa con balcones en donde
la luz de Junio ahogaba flores en tu boca?
Hermano, hermano
Todo
era grandes voces, sal de mercaderías,
aglomeraciones de pan palpitante,
mercados de mi barrio de Arguelles con su estatua
como un tintero pálido entre las merluzas:
el aceite llegaba a las cuchatas,
un profundo latido
de pies y manos llenaba las calles,
metros, litros, esencia
aguda de la vida,
pescados hacinados,
contextura de techos con sol frío en el cual
la flecha se fatiga,
delirante marfil fino de las patatas,
tomates repetidos hasta el mar.
Y una mañana todo estaba ardiendo
y una mañana las hogueras
salían de la tierra
devorando seres,
y desde entonces fuego,
pólvora desde entonces,
y desde entonces sangre.
Bandidos con aviones y con moros,
bandidos con sortijas y duquesas,
bandidos con firailes negros bendiciendo
venían por el cielo a matar niños,
y por las calles la sangre de los niños
corría simplemente, como sangre de niños.
Chacales que el chacal rechazaría,
piedras que el cardo seco mordería escupiendo,
víboras que las víboras odiaran!
Frente a vosotros he visto la sangre
de España levantarse
para ahogaros en una sola ola
de orgullo y de cuchillos!
Generales
traidores:
mirad mi casa muerta,
mirad España rota:
pero de cada casa muerta sale metal ardiendo
en vez de flores,
pero de cada hueco de España
sale España,
pero de cada niño muerto sale un fusil con ojos,
pero de cada crimen nacen balas
que os hallarán un día el sitio
del corazon.
Preguntaréis por qué su poesía