En el patio / Ramón Palomares

In the Patio

So there I was amid the patio flowers
with the cayennes
enjoying the leaves and the rays from the sky.

This is where I make my bed and lie down
and bathe myself in flowers.
And then I’ll go out to tell the snakes and chickens
and all the trees.
I was on the betulias and on the rose tiles
conversing, dining, listening to the wind.

Tomorrow I’ll tell the elder I’m leaving
far away, over where the men are singing,
where the dead run and bury themselves.
I was walking near some trees, near some golden leaves
and I was eating the stars, and I sat down
and I listened to the tall grass and I saw a woman’s eyes
that were shining like a tooth
then I tossed a big orange tree branch
and everything went dark.




Paisano (1964)


Translator’s Note: Ramón Palomares (Escuque, 1935) has just been awarded the Premio Fray Luis de León de Poesía Iberoamericana given by La Sociedad de Estudios Literarios y Humanísticos de Salamanca in Spain.




{ Ramón Palomares, Vuelta a casa, Caracas: Biblioteca Ayacucho, 2006 }