Promenade (1914) by August Macke, by Ericka Ghersi (translated by Toshiya Kamei)

Promenade, by August Macke (Germany) 1914 .

Paseo de a tres (1914) de August Macke
 
Otro agente ha llegado,
y la identidad
es el pasaporte difícil de esconder.
Tomó de la sangre
aún derramada en los rosales,
limpió su rostro
y en sus ojos cansados estabas tú,
tatuada sobre un fondo blanco.
 
Deja abiertas las ventanas que dan al jardín
para que las hojas vuelen
y caigan como cuando no hay nada qué decir.
Recuerda que en el último cuerpo
hubo culpa
y los gatos rasgaron el óleo.
Las hormigas guardaron algo de los cadáveres,
aquello que servirá para invierno. Y tú,
regresaste a besar mi pecho. Pero muchacha,
tengo la nostalgia de un vientre vacío,
y tus hormigas se angustian mientras camino,
esperando que mi cuerpo caiga
sobre las rutas abandonadas.
 
Es fácil para ti arrastrarme hacia tu bosque,
hundirme en la firmeza de los huesos de tus muertos,
herirme entre los rosales.
Sin embargo, me levantas.
No me quieres para las moscas.

Ericka Ghersi 
 
Promenade (1914) by August Macke

Another agent has arrived,
and his identity
is the passport hard to hide.
He drank the blood
still wet on the rosebushes
and wiped his face.
His weary eyes mirrored you,
tattooed on a white background.
 
Keep the windows overlooking the garden open
so that the leaves fly
and fall like when there's nothing to say.
Remember that there was guilt
in the last body
and the cats ripped the oil painting apart.
The ants kept something from the dead bodies,
something that would be useful in winter. And you
came back to kiss my chest. But girl,
I feel nostalgic like an empty womb,
and your ants get upset while I walk,
they wait for my body to fall
on the abandoned roads.
 
It's easy for you to drag me to your woods,
hide me in the hard bones of your dead,
hurt me in the rosebushes.
But you pick me up.
You don't want to leave me for the flies.
 
Ericka Ghersi (translated by Toshiya Kamei)

This poem first appeared in Parthenon West Review.

Born in Peru, Ericka Ghersi obtained her PhD from the University of Florida. She currently lives in Gainesville, Florida, where she is an Associate Professor at Santa Fe College. She is the author of the poetry collections Zenobia y el anciano (1994) and Contra la ausencia (2002). Her poems have also appeared in the bilingual anthology La Canasta.

Toshiya Kamei holds an MFA in Literary Translation from the University of Arkansas. His translations include Liliana Blum's The Curse of Eve and Other Stories (2008), Naoko Awa's The Fox's Window and Other Stories (2010), Espido Freire's Irlanda (2011), and Selfa Chew's Silent Herons (2012). Other translations have appeared in The Global Game (2008), Sudden Fiction Latino (2010), and My Mother She Killed Me, My Father He Ate Me (2010).