On Her Portrait, by Sor Juana Inés de la Cruz, Translated by Julie Steiner

The words on the red lectern declare this painting to be a “FIEL COPIA” (“faithful copy”) of an earlier portrait of Sor Juana Inés de la Cruz (1651-1695), by Juan de Miranda (Mexico) (c.1667?-1714)

On Her Portrait, by Sor Juana Inés de la Cruz, Translated by Julie Steiner

Sonnet 145 (On Her Portrait), by Sor Juana Inés de la Cruz

This thing you see — this coloured fraudulence
that shows the heights that Art aspires to
by means of specious arguments of hue --
is but a cunning scheme to swindle sense.

This thing — within which, flattery’s pretense
forgives the horrors that the years accrue
and, vanquishing what time’s ordeals can do,
defeats old age, and fame’s impermanence --

is but a futile, toil-filled artifice;
is but a dainty flower the winds distress;
is but a frail defense from Fate’s abyss;
 
is but a foolish errand, meaningless;
is but a failed attempt, and — viewed like this --
is corpse, is dust, is shade, is nothingness.

Sor Juana Inés de la Cruz, translated by Julie Steiner

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Sonnet 145 (A su retrato)

Este que ves, engaño colorido,
que del Arte ostentando los primores,
con falsos silogismos de colores
es cauteloso engaño del sentido:

éste, en quien la lisonja ha pretendido
excusar de los años los horrores,
y, venciendo del tiempo los rigores,
triunfar de la vejez y del olvido:

es un vano artificio del cuidado:
es una flor al viento delicada;
es un resguardo inútil para el Hado;

es una necia diligencia errada;
es un afán caduco, y bien mirado,
es cádaver, es polvo, es sombra, es nada.

Sor Juana Inés de la Cruz

Translator’s Note: All extant portraits of Sor Juana Inés de la Cruz (Mexico, 1651–1695) are believed to be copies — some apparently more faithful than others — for which the original did, indeed, lose its battle against oblivion. The large, round "nun's shield" shown beneath her chin, bearing an image of the Annunciation, was part of the Hieronymite Order’s uniform. Contemporary admirers of her poetic and musical compositions nicknamed this Baroque writer of mixed Spanish and Indigenous Mexican heritage “The Tenth Muse” and “The Phoenix of America."
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Julie Steiner is the pseudonym of a recovering classicist in San Diego, California. Links to many of her published poems and verse translations are posted at Off-Piste on Mount Parnassus (offpisteonmountp.substack.com).