Casi un país (1) / Elizabeth Schön

Almost A Country (1)

     I was born in Borburata. There was a green plant holder in the hallway; the water would hurl itself down and would echo inside the clay jug with a sound like small coins falling. A fountain stood out in the patio; the ferns bunched up around it and formed a greenish, humid awning that smelled pleasant. The pillars were round, made of wood, and nails that sometimes injured, jutted out of the cracked sections.
     The house had few rooms. The rooftops were made out of cañabrava wood and mangrove beams; that’s where the spiders wove their hives, which packed the edges of the wooden framework. On the headpieces of the beds and in the water jugs, the moths and a fine, golden sand brought in by the wind from the distant sea would always accumulate. Two little stoves were always turned on; occasionally, a fly or a bee, who had been hunting the soup that was being cooked, would scorch itself within the embers.
     Behind the yard, where an apamate tree grew, ran a gorge. The cows would go there to drink, while the thrushes picked at their feathers and I thought of the day I would live in Caracas, Caracas which I imagined as if it were the most beautiful, immense palace inhabited by glorious men.


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Casi un país (1)

     Nací en Borburata. En el corredor había un tinajero verde; el agua se precipitaba y sonaba dentro del bernegal con un ruido semejante al de las monedas pequeñas al caer. En el patio se destacaba una fuente; los helechos se amontonaban alrededor y formaban una carpa verdosa, húmeda, que olía gratamente. Los pilares eran redondos, de madera, y en los sitios resquebrajados, apuntaban clavos que, a veces, herían.
     La casa no tenía muchas habitaciones. Los techos estaban construidos de cañabrava y viguetas de mangle; allí las harañas tejían sus enjambres que tupían los bordes del maderaje. En los copetes de las camas, en los aguamaniles, siempre se hacinaban la polilla y una arena fina, dorada, que el viento traía del mar lejano. Dos hornillas permanecían prendidas; dentro de las brasas, de vez en cuando, se asaban una mosca, una abeja, que habían estado cazando el caldo que se cocía.
     Detrás del corral, donde crecía un árbol de apamate, una quebrada corría, ahí las vacas iban a beber, mientras los torditos picoteaban sus lomos y yo pensaba en el día que viviese en Caracas, Caracas que la imaginaba igual al palacio más bello, inmenso, habitado por hombres gloriosos.




1972




Translator’s note: English version originally published in Typo, issue 18 (2013).
Image: Elizabeth Schön, by Alfredo Cortina.




{ Elizabeth Schön, Antología poética, Caracas: Monte Ávila Editores, 1998 }