Federico García Lorca
Translated from the Spanish by Merryn Williams
I want to go down to the well, I want
to climb the walls of Granada,
to see the heart that has been pierced
by the dark needle of water.

The wounded boy was groaning
his head crowned with white frost.
Ponds, cisterns and fountains
raised to the air their swords.

Ah, what fury of love, what a cutting edge,
dark murmurs, a death so white!
Sunk in the sands of daybreak,
what deserts of light!
The boy was alone, the city
in his throat, asleep.
A spout of dreams protects him from
the hunger of seaweed.
The boy and his agony, face to face,
were two green rains entwined.
The boy stretched out upon the earth,
his agony curved round.

I want to go down to the well, I want
to die my death by mouthfuls,
to fill my heart with moss, to see
one wounded by the water.



Casida del herido por el agua

Quiero bajar al pozo,
quiero subir los muros de Granada,
para mirar el corazón pasado
por el punzón oscuro de las aguas.

El niño herido gemía
con una corona de escarcha.
Estanques, aljibes y fuentes
levantaban al aire sus espadas.

¡Ay qué furia de amor, qué hiriente filo,
qué nocturno rumor, qué muerte blanca!
¡Qué desiertos de luz iban hundiendo
los arenales de la madrugada!
El niño estaba solo
con la ciudad dormida en la garganta.
Un surtidor que viene de los sueños
lo defiende del hambre de las algas.
El niño y su agonía frente a frente,
eran dos verdes lluvias enlazadas.
El niño se tendía por la tierra
y su agonía se curvaba.

Quiero bajar al pozo,
quiero morir mi muerte a bocanadas,
quiero llenar mi corazón de musgo,
para ver al herido por el agua.
from the book SELECTED POEMS / Bloodaxe Books
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If I translate a poem I'm mainly concerned that it should work in English, and this heartbreaking Casida speaks for itself. The boy is obviously dying an unnatural death; Lorca sensed the violence below the surface in Spain before the Civil War. It is important for him to get close to the source of life, water, and if anything is able to cure his agony, this may.

Merryn Williams on "Casida of One Wounded by the Water"
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Ilya Kaminsky on What Poetry Offers in Crisis

"A very interesting thing happened in 2014, (when) Russia first invaded Ukraine. Boris Khersonsky was—at that time—the most known and beloved Russian language poet in Ukraine. And he said in public that 'today, I am not going to speak Russian, I'm going to speak Ukrainian.'  And he began writing poems in Ukrainian. So it's amazing that a poet would refuse his own language."

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