Este mi escueto homenaje a un poeta americano que dejó honda huella no sólo en la literatura americana de su época sino en la universal, traspasando fronteras y centurias y cuyas influencias han llegado directamente a autores de la talla de Rubén Darío, Federico García Lorca, Pablo Neruda, T.S. Elliot y un largo etcétera que no conviene destacar por ser precisamente eso, un largo etcétera.
Padre del verso libre, es uno de los autores que más me ha inspirado siempre, puedo decir además que es uno de mis favoritos, capaz de transportarme a un estado más allá de lo tangible del que tanto disfruto (sí, admito que también soy trascendental como el propio Whitman lo fue) porque sus versos tocan y dan alas al alma.
Su muerte se rememoró hace justo una semana, un 26 de marzo de 1892, abandonaba el mundo dejando un legado cultural y humano incalculable con obras tan significativas como "Hojas de Hierba" o "Canto a mí mismo" y para homenajearlo, qué mejor modo que dejando aquí dos fragmentos de la maravillosa "Song of myself" en su verdadera forma, en inglés, tal y como lo escribió el autor.
Disfrutad de este regalo que nos legó para recordar quiénes somos realmente y darnos el valor que merecemos.
I
I CELEBRATE myself, and sing myself,
And what I assume you shall assume,
For every atom belonging to me as good belongs to you.
I loafe and invite my soul,
I lean and loafe at my ease observing a spear of summer grass.
My tongue, every atom of my blood, form'd from this soil,
this air,
Born here of parents born here from parents the same, and
their parents the same,
I, now thirty-seven years old in perfect health begin,
Hoping to cease not till death.
Creeds and schools in abeyance,
Retiring back a while sufficed at what they are, but never
forgotten,
I harbor for good or bad, I permit to speak at every hazard,
Nature without check with original energy.
(...)
I have heard what the talkers were talking, the talk of the
beginning and the end,
But I do not talk of the beginning or the end.
There was never any more inception than there is now,
Nor any more youth or age than there is now,
And will never be any more perfection than there is now,
Nor any more heaven or hell than there is now.
Urge and urge and urge,
Always the procreant urge of the world.
Out of the dimness opposite equals advance, always
substance and increase, always sex,
Always a knit of identity, always distinction, always a breed
of life.
To elaborate is no avail, learn'd and unlearn'd feel that it is so.
Sure as the most certain sure, plumb in the uprights, well
entretied, braced in the beams,
Stout as a horse, affectionate, haughty, electrical,
I and this mystery here we stand.
Clear and sweet is my soul, and clear and sweet is all that is
not my soul.
Lack one lacks both, and the unseen is proved by the seen,
Till that becomes unseen and receives proof in its turn.
Showing the best and dividing it from the worst age vexes age,
Knowing the perfect fitness and equanimity of things, while
they discuss I am silent, and go bathe and admire myself.
Welcome is every organ and attribute of me, and of any man
hearty and clean,
Not an inch nor a particle of an inch is vile, and none shall be
less familiar than the rest.
I am satisfied — I see, dance, laugh, sing;
As the hugging and loving bed-fellow sleeps at my side
through the night, and withdraws at the peep of the day
with stealthy tread,
Leaving me baskets cover'd with white towels swelling the
house with their plenty,
Shall I postpone my acceptation and realization and scream
at my eyes,
That they turn from gazing after and down the road,
And forthwith cipher and show me to a cent,
Exactly the value of one and exactly the value of two, and
which is ahead?
(Walt Whitman)
I CELEBRATE myself, and sing myself,
And what I assume you shall assume,
For every atom belonging to me as good belongs to you.
I loafe and invite my soul,
I lean and loafe at my ease observing a spear of summer grass.
My tongue, every atom of my blood, form'd from this soil,
this air,
Born here of parents born here from parents the same, and
their parents the same,
I, now thirty-seven years old in perfect health begin,
Hoping to cease not till death.
Creeds and schools in abeyance,
Retiring back a while sufficed at what they are, but never
forgotten,
I harbor for good or bad, I permit to speak at every hazard,
Nature without check with original energy.
(...)
III
beginning and the end,
But I do not talk of the beginning or the end.
There was never any more inception than there is now,
Nor any more youth or age than there is now,
And will never be any more perfection than there is now,
Nor any more heaven or hell than there is now.
Urge and urge and urge,
Always the procreant urge of the world.
Out of the dimness opposite equals advance, always
substance and increase, always sex,
Always a knit of identity, always distinction, always a breed
of life.
To elaborate is no avail, learn'd and unlearn'd feel that it is so.
Sure as the most certain sure, plumb in the uprights, well
entretied, braced in the beams,
Stout as a horse, affectionate, haughty, electrical,
I and this mystery here we stand.
Clear and sweet is my soul, and clear and sweet is all that is
not my soul.
Lack one lacks both, and the unseen is proved by the seen,
Till that becomes unseen and receives proof in its turn.
Showing the best and dividing it from the worst age vexes age,
Knowing the perfect fitness and equanimity of things, while
they discuss I am silent, and go bathe and admire myself.
Welcome is every organ and attribute of me, and of any man
hearty and clean,
Not an inch nor a particle of an inch is vile, and none shall be
less familiar than the rest.
I am satisfied — I see, dance, laugh, sing;
As the hugging and loving bed-fellow sleeps at my side
through the night, and withdraws at the peep of the day
with stealthy tread,
Leaving me baskets cover'd with white towels swelling the
house with their plenty,
Shall I postpone my acceptation and realization and scream
at my eyes,
That they turn from gazing after and down the road,
And forthwith cipher and show me to a cent,
Exactly the value of one and exactly the value of two, and
which is ahead?
(Walt Whitman)
Camino
Estoy siguiendo un camino
y mientras ando por él
tengo la fastidiosa costumbre
de preguntarme qué camino seguir,
como si estuviera ciega
y no viera el que sigo,
¡pero si ya estoy siguiendo uno!
delatan mi recorrido las huellas chivatas...
He conocido a muchas personas entretanto
algunos incluso se quedaron atrás,
otros siguieron diferentes
sendas y muchos más,
se han perdido.
Por mi parte sólo quiero llegar
al único lugar que ansío conocer,
mi destino,
pero para poder llegar a él,
el único modo es disfrutar de todo esto.
Pido para tener certeza,
no fe, sino certeza,
de que a cada paso que dé,
se siga presentando la tierra bajo mis pies,
los árboles den oxígeno
y haya un sendero que pisar.
Beatriz Casaus 2013 ©
No hay comentarios:
Publicar un comentario