Federico Garcia Lorca

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    Biographical information

  1. Ballad Of The Moon
  2. Before The Dawn
  3. City That Does Not Sleep
  4. Ditty Of First Desire
  5. Fare Well
  6. Gacela Of The Dark Death
  7. Gacela Of The Dead Child
  8. Gacela Of Unforseen Love
  9. Lament For Ignacio Sanchez Mejias
  10. Little Viennese Waltz
  11. Saturday Paseo: Adelina
  12. Serenata
  13. Sonnet Of The Sweet Complaint
  14. The Faithless Wife
  15. The Gipsy And The Wind
  16. The Guitar
  17. The Little Mute Boy
  18. The Weeping
  19. Train Ride
  20. Tree, Tree, Dry And Green
  21. Weeping




    Biographical information
      Name: Federico García Lorca
      Place and date of birth: Fuente Vaqueros, Granada (Spain); June 5, 1898
      Place and date of death: Víznar, Granada (Spain); August 18, 1936 (aged 38)
    Up

      Ballad Of The Moon
        The moon came into the forge
        in her bustle of flowering nard.
        The little boy stares at her, stares.
        The boy is staring hard.
        In the shaken air
        the moon moves her amrs,
        and shows lubricious and pure,
        her breasts of hard tin.
        "Moon, moon, moon, run!
        If the gypsies come,
        they will use your heart
        to make white necklaces and rings."
        "Let me dance, my little one.
        When the gypsies come,
        they'll find you on the anvil
        with your lively eyes closed tight.
        "Moon, moon, moon, run!
        I can feelheir horses come."
        "Let me be, my little one,
        don't step on me, all starched and white!"

        Closer comes the the horseman,
        drumming on the plain.
        The boy is in the forge;
        his eyes are closed.
        Through the olive grove
        come the gypsies, dream and bronze,
        their heads held high,
        their hooded eyes.

        Oh, how the night owl calls,
        calling, calling from its tree!
        The moon is climbing through the sky
        with the child by the hand.

        They are crying in the forge,
        all the gypsies, shouting, crying.
        The air is veiwing all, views all.
        The air is at the viewing.
      Up

      Before The Dawn
        But like love
        the archers
        are blind

        Upon the green night,
        the piercing saetas
        leave traces of warm
        lily.

        The keel of the moon
        breaks through purple clouds
        and their quivers
        fill with dew.

        Ay, but like love
        the archers
        are blind!
      Up

      City That Does Not Sleep
        In the sky there is nobody asleep. Nobody, nobody.
        Nobody is asleep.
        The creatures of the moon sniff and prowl about their cabins.
        The living iguanas will come and bite the men who do not dream,
        And the man who rushes out with his spirit broken will meet on the street corner
        The unbelievable alligator quiet beneath the tender protest of the stars.
        Nobody is asleep on earth. Nobody, nobody.
        Nobody is asleep.
        In a graveyard far off there is a corpse
        Who has moaned for three years
        Because of a dry countryside on his knee;
        And that boy they buried this morning cried so much
        It was necessary to call out the dogs to keep him quiet.
        Life is not a dream. Careful! Careful! Careful!
        We fall down the stairs in order to eat the moist earth
        Or we climb to the knife edge of the snow with the voices of the dead dahlias.
        But forgetfulness does not exist, dreams do not exist;
        Flesh exists. Kisses tie our mouths
        In a thicket of new veins,
        And whoever his pain pains will feel that pain forever
        And whoever is afraid of death will carry it on his shoulders.
        One day
        The horses will live in the saloons
        And the enraged ants
        Will throw themselves on the yellow skies that take refuge in the eyes of cows.
        Another day
        We will watch the preserved butterflies rise from the dead
        And still walking through a country of gray sponges and silent boats
        We will watch our ring flash and roses spring from our tongue.
        Careful! Be careful! Be careful!
        The men who still have marks of the claw and the thunderstorm,
        And that boy who cries because he has never heard of the invention of the bridge,
        Or that dead man who possesses now only his head and a shoe,
        We must carry them to the wall where the iguanas and the snakes are waiting,
        Where the bear's teeth are waiting,
        Where the mummified hand of the boy is waiting,
        And the hair of the camel stands on end with a violent blue shudder.
        Nobody is sleeping in the sky. Nobody, nobody.
        Nobody is sleeping.
        If someone does close his eyes,
        A whip, boys, a whip!
        Let there be a landscape of open eyes
        And bitter wounds on fire.
        No one is sleeping in this world. No one, no one.
        I have said it before.
        No one is sleeping.
        But if someone grows too much moss on his temples during the night,
        Open the stage trapdoors so he can see in the moonlight
        The lying goblets, and the poison, and the skull of the theaters.
      Up

      Ditty Of First Desire
        In the green morning
        I wanted to be a heart.
        A heart.
        And in the ripe evening
        I wanted to be a nightingale.
        A nightingale.
        (Soul,
        Turn orangecolored.
        Soul,
        Turn the color of love).
        In the vivid morning
        I wanted to be myself.
        A heart.
        And at the evening's end
        I wanted to be my voice.
        A nightingale.
        Soul,
        Turn orangecolored.
        Soul,
        Turn the color of love.
      Up

      Fare Well
        If I die,
        leave the balcony open.

        The little boy is eating oranges.
        (From my balcony I can see him.)

        The reaper is harvesting the wheat.
        (From my balcony I can hear him.)

        If I die,
        leave the balcony open!
      Up

      Fare Well
        If I die,
        leave the balcony open.

        The little boy is eating oranges.
        (From my balcony I can see him.)

        The reaper is harvesting the wheat.
        (From my balcony I can hear him.)

        If I die,
        leave the balcony open!
      Up

      Gacela Of The Dark Death
        I want to sleep the sleep of the apples,
        I want to get far away from the busyness of the cemeteries.
        I want to sleep the sleep of that child
        Who longed to cut his heart open far out at sea.
        I don't want them to tell me again how the corpse keeps all its blood,
        How the decaying mouth goes on begging for water.
        I'd rather not hear about the torture sessions the grass arranges for
        Nor about how the moon does all its work before dawn
        With its snakelike nose.
        I want to sleep for half a second,
        A second, a minute, a century,
        But I want everyone to know that I am still alive,
        That I have a golden manger inside my lips,
        That I am the little friend of the west wind,
        That I am the elephantine shadow of my own tears.
        When it's dawn just throw some sort of cloth over me
        Because I know dawn will toss fistfuls of ants at me,
        And pour a little hard water over my shoes
        So that the scorpion claws of the dawn will slip off.
        Because I want to sleep the sleep of the apples,
        And learn a mournful song that will clean all earth away from me,
        Because I want to live with that shadowy child
        Who longed to cut his heart open far out at sea.
      Up

      Gacela Of The Dead Child
        Each afternoon in Granada,
        each afternoon, a child dies.
        Each afternoon the water sits down
        and chats with its companions.

        The dead wear mossy wings.
        The cloudy wind and the clear wind
        are two pheasants in flight through the towers,
        and the day is a wounded boy.

        Not a flicker of lark was left in the air
        when I met you in the caverns of wine.
        Not the crumb of a cloud was left in the ground
        when you were drowned in the river.

        A giant of water fell down over the hills,
        and the valley was tumbling with lilies and dogs.
        In my hands' violet shadow, your body,
        dead on the bank, was an angel of coldness.
      Up

      Gacela Of Unforseen Love
        No one understood the perfume
        of the dark magnolia of your womb.
        Nobody knew that you tormented
        a hummingbird of love between your teeth.

        A thousand Persian little horses fell asleep
        in the plaza with moon of your forehead,
        while through four nights I embraced
        your waist, enemy of the snow.

        Between plaster and jasmins, your glance
        was a pale branch of seeds.
        I sought in my heart to give you
        the ivory letters that say "siempre",

        "siempre", "siempre" : garden of my agony,
        your body elusive always,
        that blood of your veins in my mouth,
        your mouth already lightless for my death.
      Up

      Lament For Ignacio Sanchez Mejias
        1. Cogida and death

        At five in the afternoon.
        It was exactly five in the afternoon.
        A boy brought the white sheet
        at five in the afternoon.
        A frail of lime ready prepared
        at five in the afternoon.
        The rest was death, and death alone.

        The wind carried away the cottonwool
        at five in the afternoon.
        And the oxide scattered crystal and nickel
        at five in the afternoon.
        Now the dove and the leopard wrestle
        at five in the afternoon.
        And a thigh with a desolated horn
        at five in the afternoon.
        The bass-string struck up
        at five in the afternoon.
        Arsenic bells and smoke
        at five in the afternoon.
        Groups of silence in the corners
        at five in the afternoon.
        And the bull alone with a high heart!
        At five in the afternoon.
        When the sweat of snow was coming
        at five in the afternoon,
        when the bull ring was covered with iodine
        at five in the afternoon.
        Death laid eggs in the wound
        at five in the afternoon.
        At five in the afternoon.
        At five o'clock in the afternoon.

        A coffin on wheels is his bed
        at five in the afternoon.
        Bones and flutes resound in his ears
        at five in the afternoon.
        Now the bull was bellowing through his forehead
        at five in the afternoon.
        The room was iridiscent with agony
        at five in the afternoon.
        In the distance the gangrene now comes
        at five in the afternoon.
        Horn of the lily through green groins
        at five in the afternoon.
        The wounds were burning like suns
        at five in the afternoon.
        At five in the afternoon.
        Ah, that fatal five in the afternoon!
        It was five by all the clocks!
        It was five in the shade of the afternoon!



        2. The Spilled Blood

        I will not see it!

        Tell the moon to come,
        for I do not want to see the blood
        of Ignacio on the sand.

        I will not see it!

        The moon wide open.
        Horse of still clouds,
        and the grey bull ring of dreams
        with willows in the barreras.

        I will not see it!

        Let my memory kindle!
        Warm the jasmines
        of such minute whiteness!

        I will not see it!

        The cow of the ancient world
        passed har sad tongue
        over a snout of blood
        spilled on the sand,
        and the bulls of Guisando,
        partly death and partly stone,
        bellowed like two centuries
        sated with threading the earth.
        No.
        I will not see it!

        Ignacio goes up the tiers
        with all his death on his shoulders.
        He sought for the dawn
        but the dawn was no more.
        He seeks for his confident profile
        and the dream bewilders him
        He sought for his beautiful body
        and encountered his opened blood
        Do not ask me to see it!
        I do not want to hear it spurt
        each time with less strength:
        that spurt that illuminates
        the tiers of seats, and spills
        over the cordury and the leather
        of a thirsty multiude.
        Who shouts that I should come near!
        Do not ask me to see it!

        His eyes did not close
        when he saw the horns near,
        but the terrible mothers
        lifted their heads.
        And across the ranches,
        an air of secret voices rose,
        shouting to celestial bulls,
        herdsmen of pale mist.
        There was no prince in Sevilla
        who could compare to him,
        nor sword like his sword
        nor heart so true.
        Like a river of lions
        was his marvellous strength,
        and like a marble toroso
        his firm drawn moderation.
        The air of Andalusian Rome
        gilded his head
        where his smile was a spikenard
        of wit and intelligence.
        What a great torero in the ring!
        What a good peasant in the sierra!
        How gentle with the sheaves!
        How hard with the spurs!
        How tender with the dew!
        How dazzling the fiesta!
        How tremendous with the final
        banderillas of darkness!

        But now he sleeps without end.
        Now the moss and the grass
        open with sure fingers
        the flower of his skull.
        And now his blood comes out singing;
        singing along marshes and meadows,
        sliden on frozen horns,
        faltering soulles in the mist
        stoumbling over a thousand hoofs
        like a long, dark, sad tongue,
        to form a pool of agony
        close to the starry Guadalquivir.
        Oh, white wall of Spain!
        Oh, black bull of sorrow!
        Oh, hard blood of Ignacio!
        Oh, nightingale of his veins!
        No.
        I will not see it!
        No chalice can contain it,
        no swallows can drink it,
        no frost of light can cool it,
        nor song nor deluge og white lilies,
        no glass can cover mit with silver.
        No.
        I will not see it!



        3. The Laid Out Body

        Stone is a forehead where dreames grieve
        without curving waters and frozen cypresses.
        Stone is a shoulder on which to bear Time
        with trees formed of tears and ribbons and planets.

        I have seen grey showers move towards the waves
        raising their tender riddle arms,
        to avoid being caught by lying stone
        which loosens their limbs without soaking their blood.

        For stone gathers seed and clouds,
        skeleton larks and wolves of penumbra:
        but yields not sounds nor crystals nor fire,
        only bull rings and bull rings and more bull rings without walls.

        Now, Ignacio the well born lies on the stone.
        All is finished. What is happening! Contemplate his face:
        death has covered him with pale sulphur
        and has place on him the head of dark minotaur.

        All is finished. The rain penetrates his mouth.
        The air, as if mad, leaves his sunken chest,
        and Love, soaked through with tears of snow,
        warms itself on the peak of the herd.

        What is they saying? A stenching silence settles down.
        We are here with a body laid out which fades away,
        with a pure shape which had nightingales
        and we see it being filled with depthless holes.

        Who creases the shroud? What he says is not true!
        Nobody sings here, nobody weeps in the corner,
        nobody pricks the spurs, nor terrifies the serpent.
        Here I want nothing else but the round eyes
        to see his body without a chance of rest.

        Here I want to see those men of hard voice.
        Those that break horses and dominate rivers;
        those men of sonorous skeleton who sing
        with a mouth full of sun and flint.

        Here I want to see them. Before the stone.
        Before this body with broken reins.
        I want to know from them the way out
        for this captain stripped down by death.

        I want them to show me a lament like a river
        wich will have sweet mists and deep shores,
        to take the body of Ignacio where it looses itself
        without hearing the double planting of the bulls.

        Loses itself in the round bull ring of the moon
        which feigns in its youth a sad quiet bull,
        loses itself in the night without song of fishes
        and in the white thicket of frozen smoke.

        I don't want to cover his face with handkerchiefs
        that he may get used to the death he carries.
        Go, Ignacio, feel not the hot bellowing
        Sleep, fly, rest: even the sea dies!



        4. Absent Soul

        The bull does not know you, nor the fig tree,
        nor the horses, nor the ants in your own house.
        The child and the afternoon do not know you
        because you have dead forever.

        The shoulder of the stone does not know you
        nor the black silk, where you are shuttered.
        Your silent memory does not know you
        because you have died forever

        The autumn will come with small white snails,
        misty grapes and clustered hills,
        but no one will look into your eyes
        because you have died forever.

        Because you have died for ever,
        like all the dead of the earth,
        like all the dead who are forgotten
        in a heap of lifeless dogs.

        Nobady knows you. No. But I sing of you.
        For posterity I sing of your profile and grace.
        Of the signal maturity of your understanding.
        Of your appetite for death and the taste of its mouth.
        Of the sadness of your once valiant gaiety.

        It will be a long time, if ever, before there is born
        an Andalusian so true, so rich in adventure.
        I sing of his elegance with words that groan,
        and I remember a sad breeze through the olive trees.
      Up

      Little Viennese Waltz
        In Vienna there are ten little girls,
        a shoulder for death to cry on,
        and a forest of dried pigeons.
        There is a fragment of tomorrow
        in the museum of winter frost.
        There is a thousand-windowed dance hall.

        Ay, ay, ay, ay!
        Take this close-mouthed waltz.

        Little waltz, little waltz, little waltz,
        of itself of death, and of brandy
        that dips its tail in the sea.

        I love you, I love you, I love you,
        with the armchair and the book of death,
        down the melancholy hallway,
        in the iris's darkened garret,

        Ay, ay, ay, ay!
        Take this broken-waisted waltz.

        In Vienna there are four mirrors
        in which your mouth and the ehcoes play.
        There is a death for piano
        that paints little boys blue.
        There are beggars on the roof.
        There are fresh garlands of tears.

        Ay, ay, ay, ay!
        Take this waltz that dies in my arms.

        Because I love you, I love you, my love,
        in the attic where the children play,
        dreaming ancient lights of Hungary
        through the noise, the balmy afternoon,
        seeing sheep and irises of snow
        through the dark silence of your forehead

        Ay, ay, ay, ay!
        Take this " I will always love you" waltz

        In Vienna I will dance with you
        in a costume with
        a river's head.
        See how the hyacinths line my banks!
        I will leave my mouth between your legs,
        my soul in a photographs and lilies,
        and in the dark wake of your footsteps,
        my love, my love, I will have to leave
        violin and grave, the waltzing ribbons
      Up

      Saturday Paseo: Adelina
        Oranges
        do not grow in the sea
        neither is there love in Sevilla.
        You in Dark and the I the sun that's hot,
        loan me your parasol.

        I'll wear my jealous reflection,
        juice of lemon and lime-
        and your words,
        your sinful little words-
        will swim around awhile.

        Oranges
        do not grow in the sea,
        Ay, love!
        And there is no love in Sevilla!
      Up

      Serenata
        The night soaks itself
        along the shore of the river
        and in Lolita's breasts
        the branches die of love.

        The branches die of love.

        Naked the night sings
        above the bridges of March.
        Lolita bathes her body
        with salt water and roses.

        The branches die of love.

        The night of anise and silver
        shines over the rooftops.
        Silver of streams and mirrors
        Anise of your white thighs.

        The branches die of love.
      Up

      Sonnet Of The Sweet Complaint
        Never let me lose the marvel
        Of your statuelike eyes, or the accent
        The solitary rose of your breath
        Places on my cheek at night.
        I am afraid of being, on this shore,
        A branchless trunk, and what I most regret
        Is having no flower, pulp, or clay
        For the worm of my despair.
        If you are my hidden treasure,
        If you are my cross, my dampened pain,
        If I am a dog, and you alone my master,
        Never let me lose what I have gained,
        And adorn the branches of your river
        With leaves of my estranged.
      Up

      The Faithless Wife
        So I took her to the river
        Believing she was a maiden,
        But she already had a husband.
        It was on St. James night
        And almost as if I was obliged to.
        The lanterns went out
        And the crickets lighted up.
        In the farthest street corners
        I touched her sleeping breasts
        And they opened to me suddenly
        Like spikes of hyacinth.
        The starch of her petticoat
        Sounded in my ears
        Like a piece of silk
        Rent by ten knives.
        Without silver light on their foliage
        The trees had grown larger
        And a horizon of dogs
        Barked very far from the river.
        Past the blackberries,
        The reeds and the hawthorne
        Underneath her cluster of hair
        I made a hollow in the earth
        I took off my tie,
        She too off her dress.
        I, my belt with the revolver,
        She, her four bodices.
        Nor nard nor mothero'pearl
        Have skin so fine,
        Nor does glass with silver
        Shine with such brilliance.
        Her thighs slipped away from me
        Like startled fish,
        Half full of fire,
        Half full of cold.
        That night I ran
        On the best of roads
        Mounted on a nacre mare
        Without bridle stirrups.
        As I'm a man, I won't repeat
        The things she said to me.
        The light of understanding
        Has made me more discreet.
        Smeared with sand and kisses
        I took her away from the river.
        The swords of the lilies
        Battled with the air.
        I behaved like what I am,
        Like a proper gypsy.
        I gave her a large sewing basket,
        Of strawcolored satin,
        But I did not fall in love
        For although she had a husband
        She told me she was a maiden
        When I took her to the river.
      Up

      The Gipsy And The Wind
        Playing her parchment moon
        Preciosa comes
        Along a watery path of laurels and crystal lights.
        The starless silence, fleeing
        From her rhythmic tambourine,
        Falls where the sea whips and sings,
        His night filled with silvery swarms.
        High atop the mountain peaks
        The sentinels are weeping;
        They guard the tall white towers
        Of the English consulate.
        And gypsies of the water
        For their pleasure erect
        Little castles of conch shells
        And arbors of greening pine.
        Playing her parchment moon
        Preciosa comes.
        The wind sees her and rises,
        The wind that never slumbers.
        Naked Saint Christopher swells,
        Watching the girl as he plays
        With tongues of celestial bells
        On an invisible bagpipe.
        Gypsy, let me lift your skirt
        And have a look at you.
        Open in my ancient fingers
        The blue rose of your womb.
        Preciosa throws the tambourine
        And runs away in terror.
        But the virile wind pursues her
        With his breathing and burning sword.
        The sea darkens and roars,
        While the olive trees turn pale.
        The flutes of darkness sound,
        And a muted gong of the snow.
        Preciosa, run, Preciosa!
        Or the green wind will catch you!
        Preciosa, run, Preciosa!
        And look how fast he comes!
        A satyr of lowborn stars
        With their long and glistening tongues.
        Preciosa, filled with fear,
        Now makes her way to that house
        Beyond the tall green pines
        Where the English consul lives.
        Alarmed by the anguished cries,
        Three riflemen come running,
        Their black capes tightly drawn,
        And berets down over their brow.
        The Englishman gives the gypsy
        A glass of tepid milk
        And a shot of Holland gin
        Which Preciosa does not drink.
        And while she tells them, weeping,
        Of her strange adventure,
        The wind furiously gnashes
        Against the slate roof tiles.
      Up

      The Guitar
        The weeping of the guitar
        Begins.
        The goblets of dawn
        Are smashed.
        The weeping of the guitar
        Begins.
        Useless
        To silence it.
        Impossible
        To silence it.
        It weeps monotonously
        As water weeps
        As the wind weeps
        Over snowfields.
        Impossible
        To silence it.
        It weeps for distant
        Things.
        Hot southern sands
        Yearning for white camellias.
        Weeps arrow without target
        Evening without morning
        And the first dead bird
        On the branch.
        Oh, guitar!
        Heart mortally wounded
        By five swords.
      Up

      The Little Mute Boy
        The litle boy was looking for his voice.
        (The King of the crickets had it.)
        In a drop of water
        the little boy was looking for his voice.

        I do not want it for speaking with;
        I will make a ring of it
        so that he may wear my silence
        on his little finger.

        In a drop of water
        the little boy was looking for his voice.

        (The captive voice, far away.
        Put on a cricket' clothes.)
      Up

      The Weeping
        I have shut my windows.
        I do not want to hear the weeping.
        But from behind the grey walls.
        Nothing is heard but the weeping.

        There are few angels that sing.
        There are few dogs that bark.
        A thousand violins fit in the palm of the hand.
        But the weeping is an immense angel.
        The weeping is an immense dog.
        The weeping is an immense violin.
        Tears strangle the wind.
        Nothing is heard but the weeping.
      Up

      Train Ride
        After rain, through afterglow, the unfolding fan
        of railway landscape sidled onthe pivot
        of a larger arc into the green of evening;
        I remembered that noon I saw a gradual bud
        still white; though dead in its warm bloom;
        always the enemy is the foe at home.
        And I wondered what surgery could recover
        our lost, long stride of indolence and leisure
        which is labor in reverse; what physic recall the smile
        not of lips, but of eyes as of the sea bemused.
        We, when we disperse from common sleep to several
        tasks, we gather to despair; we, who assembled
        once for hopes from common toil to dreams
        or sickish and hurting or triumphal rapture;
        always our enemy is our foe at home.
        We, deafened with far scattered city rattles
        to the hubbub of forest birds (never having
        "had time" to grieve or to hear through vivid sleep
        the sea knock on its cracked and hollow stones)
        so that the stars, almost, and birds comply,
        and the garden-wet; the trees retire; We are
        a scared patrol, fearing the guns behind;
        always the enemy is the foe at home.
        What wonder that we fear our own eyes' look
        and fidget to be at home alone, and pitifully
        put of age by some change in brushing the hair
        and stumble to our ends like smothered runners at their tape;
        We follow our shreds of fame into an ambush.
        Then (as while the stars herd to the great trough
        the blind, in the always-only-outward of their dismantled
        archways, awake at the smell of warmed stone
        or the sound of reeds, lifting from the dim
        into the segment of green dawn) always
        our enemy is our foe at home, more
        certainly than through spoken words or from grief-
        twisted writing on paper, unblotted by tears
        the thought came:
        There is no physic
        for the world's ill, nor surgery; it must
        (hot smell of tar on wet salt air)
        burn in fever forever, an incense pierced
        with arrows, whose name is Love and another name
        Rebellion (the twinge, the gulf, split seconds,
        the very raindrops, render, and instancy
        of Love).
        All Poetry to this not-to-be-looked-upon sun
        of Passion is the moon's cupped light; all
        Politics to this moon, a moon's reflected
        cupped light, like the moon of Rome, after
        the deep well of Grecian light sank low;
        always the enemy is the foe at home.
        But these three are friends whose arms twine
        without words; as, in still air,
        the great grove leans to wind, past and to come.
      Up

      Tree, Tree, Dry And Green
        Green, how I want you green.
        Green wind. Green branches.
        The ship out on the sea
        And the horse on the mountain.
        With the shade around her waist
        She dreams on her balcony,
        Green flesh, her hair green,
        With eyes of cold silver.
        Green, how I want you green.
        Under the gypsy moon,
        All things are watching her
        And she cannot see them.
        Green, how I want you green.
        Big hoarfrost stars
        Come with the fish of shadow
        That opens the road of dawn.
        The fig tree rubs its wind
        With the sandpaper of its branches,
        And the forest, cunning cat,
        Bristles its brittle fibers.
        But who will come? And from where?
        She is still on her balcony
        Green flesh, her hair green,
        Dreaming in the bitter sea.
        -My friend, I want to trade
        My horse for her house,
        My saddle for her mirror,
        My knife for her blanket.
        My friend, I come bleeding
        From the gates of Cabra.
        -If it were possible, my boy,
        I'd help you fix that trade.
        But now I am not I,
        Nor is my house now my house.
        -My friend, I want to die
        Decently in my bed.
        Of iron, if that's possible,
        With blankets of fine chambray.
        Don't you see the wound I have
        From my chest up to my throat?
        -Your white shirt has grown
        Thirsy dark brown roses.
        Your blood oozes and flees a
        Round the corners of your sash.
        But now I am not I,
        Nor is my house now my house.
        -Let me climb up, at least,
        Up to the high balconies;
        Let me climb up! Let me,
        Up to the green balconies.
        Railings of the moon
        Through which the water rumbles.
        Now the two friends climb up,
        Up to the high balconies.
        Leaving a trail of blood.
        Leaving a trail of teardrops.
        Tin bell vines
        Were trembling on the roofs.
        A thousand crystal tambourines
        Struck at the dawn light.
        Green, how I want you green,
        Green wind, green branches.
        The two friends climbed up.
        The stiff wind left
        In their mouths, a strange taste
        Of bile, of mint, and of basil
        My friend, where is she -tell me-
        Where is your bitter girl?
        How many times she waited for you!
        How many times would she wait for you,
        Cool face, black hair,
        On this green balcony!
        Over the mouth of the cistern
        The gypsy girl was swinging,
        Green flesh, her hair green,
        With eyes of cold silver.
        An icicle of moon
        Holds her up above the water.
        The night became intimate
        Like a little plaza.
        Drunken 'Guardias Civiles'
        Were pounding on the door.
        Green, how I want you green.
        Green wind. Green branches.
        The ship out on the sea.
        And the horse on the mountain.
      Up

      Weeping
        Weeping,
        I go down the street
        Grotesque, without solution
        With the sadness of Cyrano
        And Quixote.

        Redeeming
        Infinite impossiblities
        With the rhythm of the clock.

        (The captive voice, far away.
        Put on a cricket' clothes.)
      Up