divendres, de març 10, 2006

Ain't You Proud (English / Spanish)

It's been years
time has moved on
all the while in harmony with Earth's lamentations
it has been many years since you held my hand
and lied
I was a child, and I wanted to believe
in your love
your kindness
in the history and integrity of our ancient order

now you're nearly all dust
or dying
broken stories on crumbling cuneiformed clay
I remember our Enkidu
our Gilgamesh
our Ishtar
our heroines, so Austenian in guise
more like Celestina or Trotaconventos in heart

No es verdad
el engaño no es la hermosura
sino el amor

you all smiled politely at me
Black Ewe's precocious child
smiling back I believed you would always love me
you were my tribe
I wanted to stay with you forever

and yet
have you not all abandoned me
one by one
falling alseep and melting into the ground
or, consumed by extreme heat
your ashes drifted away on breezes
and turned to cement under mudpuddles
little dessecated bits of your personas
lodging in trees and wild blueberry bushes
and on clothes drying on wash lines

and where was I then
adrift in your riches
your houses that once pretended to love me
now strangers live in them
in our town all I see are ghosts around every corner
dark eyes from white faces peak out from misty yesterdays
your tight and wrinkled fists
offered little when your breath was sweet
your banks offered nothing when you breathed no more
so there I was, poor

Poor for having lost you
Poor again for having lost your cash

Still, I was not the one you loved so well
I was not the little boy who stole your heart when Kennedy was President
I was the boy from the woods
smelling of swamp mud, fern fronds and chicken coops
I was the little Black Eewe's boy

Black Ewe, she was not your best project
her gypsy hair and her sagging tits
tho worse still her selfish zeal
an afront to your clannish ways

"I always swore, as long as I lived, I would never sacrifice anything for my children!"

So she sinned again and again against your theses
but it was I who suffered

Black Ewe still lives on her knoll
her tits have sagged even more
and her hair is a color unknown to God

Did you ever stop her
make her mind
hell you did
you just kept fucking dying
my back broke from the digging and bearing
but still the earth received you
not one of you was spit back out

And sometimes
when the stupidity in me grows strong and proud
I go to commune with your ghosts
supposing for a moment that you are still out there
some-fucking-where

and there I am amid the well-meaning shipwrecks of Spiritualism
so Daisy's grandma comes to her
and Denise's little brother
and the Spirit gives a gift to Ben
but me
no one visits me
you left me on this Earth even tho I loved you
even tho you did not earn that love
and if you do still exist
your dreams have come true
Black Ewe's little boy can't bother you now
and you don't have to put up with me

I can walk all those old halls
and remember you all more fondly than I should
and I can weep for you
but you are long gone from here
just gone
or still too concerned with yourselves to look in on me
I can't tell

When I die
I hope there is an afterlife
'cos inspite of you, my life has been good
but I won't count on seeing any of you
if I'm lucky
some kind stranger will guide me along
to my reward
since a little like Blanche Dubois
I have always depended on the kindness of strangers

2 comentaris:

Unknown ha dit...

My God, I love that you quoted from The Golden Girls. :-)

I'll be seeing you soon, my friend.

Robert Jones ha dit...

This is what happens when I purloin popular culture! But I'm sorry Tree, you got your Blanche's confused, the one of GG is Blanche Deveroe ;)