1964
Jorge Luis Borges
I
Ya no es mágico el mundo. Te han dejado.
Ya no compartirás la clara luna
Ni los lentos jardines. Ya no hay una
Luna que no sea espejo del pasado,
Cristal de soledad, sol de agonías.
Adiós las mutuas manos y las sienes
Que acercaba el amor. Hoy sólo tienes
La fiel memoria y los desiertos días.
Nadie pierde (repites vanamente)
Sino lo que no tiene y no ha tenido
Nunca, pero no basta ser valiente
Para aprender el arte del olvido.
Un símbolo, una rosa, te desgarra
Y te puede matar una guitarra.
II
Ya no seré feliz. Tal vez no importa.
Hay tantas otras cosas en el mundo;
Un instante cualquiera es más profundo
Y diverso que el mar. La vida es corta
Y aunque las horas son tan largas, una
Oscura maravilla nos acecha,
La muerte, ese otro mar, esa otra flecha
Que nos libra del sol y de la luna
Y del amor. La dicha que me diste
Y me quitaste debe ser borrada;
Lo que era todo tiene que ser nada.
Sólo que me queda el goce de estar triste,
Esa vana costumbre que me inclina
Al Sur, a cierta puerta, a cierta esquina.
1964
Samantha DeStefano
I
The world’s no longer magic. They have left you.
You will no longer share the clear bright moon
Nor the slow gardens. Now there is no longer
A moon that’s not a mirror of the past,
Crystal of solitude, sun of agonies.
Goodbye to mutual hands and to our temples
That love brought near. Today you only have
The loyal memory and the deserted days.
One only loses (you repeat in vain)
What one does not have and has never had
But being brave is not enough to learn
The art of forgetting: oblivion.
A symbol or a rose tears up your heart
What’s more, you can be killed by a guitar.
II
I won’t be happy now. Perhaps it doesn’t matter.
So many other things are in the world;
A random instant is far more profound
And varied than the sea. Yes, life is short
And though the hours are so long, a dark
Wonder lies in ambush, stalking us,
Death, that other sea, that other arrow
That frees us from the sun and from the moon
And love as well. The happiness you gave me
And took away from me must be erased.
What once was everything now must be nothing.
Only that I still enjoy being sad,
That vain habit that makes me inclined to
The South, a certain door, a certain corner.
