Federico Garcia Lorca

Federico & Francisco

Gacela Of The Dark Death

I want to sleep the dream of the apples, 
to withdraw from the tumult of cemetries. 
I want to sleep the dream of that child 
who wanted to cut his heart on the high seas. 

I don't want to hear again that the dead do not lose their blood, 
that the putrid mouth goes on asking for water. 
I don't want to learn of the tortures of the grass, 
nor of the moon with a serpent's mouth 
that labors before dawn. 

I want to sleep awhile, 
awhile, a minute, a century; 
but all must know that I have not died; 
that there is a stable of gold in my lips; 
that I am the small friend of the West wing; 
that I am the intense shadows of my tears. 

Cover me at dawn with a veil, 
because dawn will throw fistfuls of ants at me, 
and wet with hard water my shoes 
so that the pincers of the scorpion slide. 

For I want to sleep the dream of the apples, 
to learn a lament that will cleanse me to earth; 
for I want to live with that dark child 
who wanted to cut his heart on the high seas. 

    Tr. Robert Bly