The Balada of New England
Translated By Carolyn Forché
Love is anterior to life.
—Emily Dickinson
Two roads diverged in a yellow wood.
—Robert Frost
After the sea, the whole sea, the cold land,
the icy wind that comes from Nova Scotia
and is a snow crab in the boots of a Maine fisherman
who comes home for dinner,
a bowl of hot soup returns the rosiness to his lips,
then he watches a log burn in the fireplace,
only fire has learned to climb on the cold,
it’s not that fierce for someone who has seen the sea rising in a storm.
The northern shores are a lament,
the crying descends through its gorges
until it touches the surface of the waves,
on the rocks
its mark remains, as in the faces
of those who have suffered,
pain leaves its ruin.
In the northern ports it dawns early
and life is as ancient as an old sea lion.
This is the shore of the first colonists
from the oldest island in the world,
they came chasing opportunities,
following the ocean currents
while they prayed,
they came because they followed the word of God
to a rocky shore touched by tears
over the same ocean from whence they came.
They brought the songs,
the nets,
their words,
they brought the hook and their churches,
but also sin.
The devil pursues his own opportunities.
The bodies of the witches of New England are hanging,
they hang before the multitude
a few steps from Salem Harbor
where fishermen set out each night
in the direction of the land of their birth.
In the northern ports, life comes back
with the smell of fish.
It’s New England time,
the sun
comes like an old puritan
and it rises over the ocean
and gives leave to the flight of the birds,
it lights a window in Amherst
where the eyes of a woman contemplate the world,
love is anterior to life,
but it departs with the birds of the dawn through her window.
The sun comes on the footprints of men,
it comes over the trees, it is reflected in the lakes,
it follows its route strictly,
without going off course,
with a will that only faith can provide,
the faith
that arrived with the first ships
to populate mountains.
But with it also came indecision
and doubt,
the East
and the West,
watchful eyes,
races,
hooks,
Sundays, even continents
without lines on the maps,
but also the maps
with their borders,
freedom,
the roads that diverge in a yellow wood.
New England’s time has come,
the sun comes from the east like a ship sent forth by the future.
Translated from the Spanish
Source: Poetry (March 2020)