#DiaMundialdelapoesía

Tulips (fragmento)

BY SYLVIA PLATH

The nurses pass and pass, they are no trouble, 

They pass the way gulls pass inland in their white caps, 

Doing things with their hands, one just the same as another, 

So it is impossible to tell how many there are. 

My body is a pebble to them, they tend it as water 

Tends to the pebbles it must run over, smoothing them gently

 

Before they came the air was calm enough,

Coming and going, breath by breath, 

without any fuss. Then the tulips filled it up like a loud noise. 

Now the air snags and eddies round them the way a river 

Snags and eddies round a sunken rust-red engine.

They concentrate my attention, that was happy 

 Playing and resting without committing itself.

The walls, also, seem to be warming themselves. 

The tulips should be behind bars like dangerous animals; 

 They are opening like the mouth of some great African cat, 

 And I am aware of my heart: it opens and closes 

Its bowl of red blooms out of sheer love of me. 

The water I taste is warm and salt, like the sea, And comes from a country far away as health. 

Marion Rose

Las enfermeras pasan una y otra vez, sin molestar, 

Igual que pasan las gaviotas volando tierra adentro, con sus cofias blancas, 

Las manos ocupadas, la una idéntica a la otra, 

Por lo que resulta imposible decir cuántas hay. 

Mi cuerpo es un guijarro para ellas, que lo cuidan como el agua 

Cuida los cantos sobre los que ha de fluir, puliéndolos suavemente.

(traducción: Xoán Abeleira)