—Anonymous Painting
SONG OF THE BARREN ORANGE TREE
—Federico García Lorca (1898-1936)
Woodcutter.
Cut my shadow from me.
Free me from the torment
of seeing myself without fruit.
Why was I born among mirrors?
The day walks in circles around me,
and the night copies me
in all its stars.
I want to live without seeing myself.
And I will dream that ants
and thistleburrs are my
leaves and my birds.
Woodcutter.
Cut my shadow from me.
Free me from the torment
of seeing myself without fruit.
(trans. from the Spanish by W.S. Merwin)
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For more about Federico García Lorca, see www.poets.org/poetsorg/poet/federico-garc%C3%ADa-lorca/. And don’t forget that today from 1-2:30pm, Anita Dash at the Sac. Public Library will present “Dulce et Decorum est”, a review and discussion of poetry that came out of World War 1. That’s at the Central Library, 828 I St., Sacramento.
—Medusa