Mantis 20 (Spring 2022)
Translations
Alejandra Pizarnik
translated from the Spanish by Lillian Jenner
de Árbol de Diana
1
He dado el salto de mí al alba.
He dejado mi cuerpo junto a la luz
y he cantado la tristeza de lo que nace.
2
Estas son las versiones que nos propone:
un agujero, una pared que tiembla...
3
sólo la sed
el silencio
ningún encuentro
cuídate de mí amor mío
cuídate de la silenciosa en el desierto
de la viajera con el vaso vacío
y de la sombra de su sombra
4
Ahora bien:
Quién dejará de hundir su mano en busca
del tributo para la pequeña olvidada. El frío
pagará. Pagará el viento. La lluvia pagará.
Pagará el trueno.
5
por un minuto de vida breve
única de ojos abiertos
por un minuto de ver
en el cerebro flores pequeñas
danzando como palabras en la boca de un mudo
6
ella se desnuda en el paraíso
de su memoria
ella desconoce el feroz destino
de sus visiones
ella tiene miedo de no saber nombrar
lo que no existe
7
Salta con la camisa en llamas
de estrella a estrella,
de sombra en sombra.
Muere de muerte lejana
la que ama al viento.
8
Memoria iluminada, galería donde vaga
la sombra de lo que espero. No es verdad
que vendrá. No es verdad que no vendrá
9
A Aurora y Julio Cortázar
Estos huesos brillando en la noche,
estas palabras como piedras preciosas
en la garganta viva de un pájaro petrificado,
este verde muy amado,
este lila caliente,
este corazón sólo misterioso.
10
un viento débil
lleno de rostros doblados
que recorto en forma de objetos que amar
11
ahora
en esta hora inocente
yo y la que fui nos sentamos
en el umbral de mi mirada
12
no más las dulces metamorfosis de una niña; de seda
sonámbula ahora en la cornisa de niebla
su despertar de mano respirando
de flor que se abre al viento
13
explicar con palabras de este mundo
que partió de mí un barco llevándome
14
El poema que no digo,
el que no merezco.
Miedo de ser dos
camino del espejo:
alguien en mí dormido
me come y me bebe.
15
Extraño desacostumbrarme
de la hora en que nací.
Extraño no ejercer más
oficio de recién llegada.
16
has construido tu casa
has emplumado tus pájaros
has golpeado al viento
con tus propios huesos
has terminado sola
lo que nadie comenzó
17
Días en que una palabra lejana se apodera de mí. Voy por esos días sonámbula y transparente. La hermosa autómata se canta, se encanta, se cuenta casos y cosas: nido de hilos rígidos donde me danzo y me lloro en mis numerosos funerales. (Ella es su espejo incendiado, su espera en hogueras frías, su elemento místico, su fornicación de nombres creciendo solos en la noche pálida.)
from Diana’s Tree
1
I’ve taken the leap from me to dawn.
I’ve left my body near the light
and sung the woe of a new birth.
2
These are the choices proposed:
a hole, a wall that trembles...
3
just the thirst
the silence
never meeting
beware of me my love
beware of her silence in the desert
(the traveler with the empty glass)
and of the shadow of her shadow
4
Now then:
Who will quit plunging her hand in search
of a token for the little forgotten one. The cold
will pay. She’ll pay for the wind. The rain will pay.
She’ll pay for the thunder.
5
for one brief moment of life
for one minute to see
with eyes open
small flowers dancing in the mind
dancing like words in the mouth of a mute
6
she strips in the paradise
of her memory
she does not know the brutish destination
of her flashes
she fears not knowing how to name
what doesn’t exist
7
She flies with her shirt on fire
from star to star
from shadow in shadow.
She dies a distant death
who loves the wind.
8
Memory alight, store where wanders
the shadow of what I expected. It isn’t true
that she’ll come. It isn’t true that she won’t
9
To Aurora and Julio Cortázar
These bones glowing in the night,
these words like gemstones
in the living throa
of a lithic bird,
this green dearly beloved,
this hot lilac,
this purely mysterious heart.
10
a weak wind
full of folded faces
I cut into the form of what to love
11
ahora
in this innocent hour
I and the I who was sat
at the threshold of my stare
12
no more sweet metamorphosis of a girl; silken
sleepwalking on the cloud cornice of ahora
her awakening hand breathing
how a flower opens to the wind
13
to explain with words from this world
that a ship from me departed, carrying me
14
The poem that I don’t say,
that I don’t deserve to.
Fear of being two,
the path of a mirror:
someone in my sleep
eats me and drinks me.
15
Strange getting out of the way of me
from the time I was born.
Odd not to exercise anymore
the office of the recently-arrived.
16
you have built your house
you have feathered your birds
you beat the wind
with your own bones
you finished by yourself
what nobody started
17
Days in which a distant word takes hold of me. For those days I am
sleepwalking and crystalline. The brilliant machine is sung, enchanted, is counted, her cases and things: a nest of taut threads where I dance and I cry my many funerals. (She is her burning mirror, her waiting in cold fires, her mystical element, her fornication in the creation of increasing names all alone in the pale white night.)
Translator’s note: Diana’s Tree, the subject of this poem, was an ancient alchemical ambition considered a precursor to the Philosopher’s Stone. It is made of crystallized silver and so called by the alchemists, among whom “Diana” meant silver.
Daughter of Russian-Jewish immigrants, ALEJANDRA PIZARNIK (1936-1972) was an Argentinian lesbian poet who wrote rather surrealist poetry in both Spanish (her native language) and French. Her use of reflexive verbs is utterly disorienting, as is her lack of pronouns amidst abstract imagery. Thematically, her writing often deals with female loneliness and the materialization of language. Pizarnik committed suicide at age 36.
LILLIAN JENNER is a poet and metal sculptor. Her undergraduate poetry thesis, In Another Language (2019), which deals with the ethics of translation, is presented as a dance. Her poems have recently appeared in Hobart Magazine. She has performed her poetry for Ghost & Projections Reading Series, Tooth & Bristle Reading Series, and Ducts Magazine’s Saturn Series. She is a 2020 recipient of The Cabin Writer Relief Grant, a 2021 recipient of the Alexa Rose Grant, and a third-year MFA poetry student and teaching assistant at Boise State University.