lunes, 11 de julio de 2022

#192 The Gift (Li-Young Lee)

Un poema bellísimo que merecería ser antologado en una versión en inglés de "Tu sangre en mis venas: Poemas al padre". El padre de Lee, por cierto, fue el médico personal de Mao Zedong... hasta que tuvo que huir con su familia a Indonesia y eventualmente a Estados Unidos.

Una cita de The Poetry Foundation:

Lee has said that he considers every poem to be a “descendent of God.” When asked about flawed poems by Poets and Writers, Lee explained: “There are great poems that have flaws. There are failures of perception, failures of understanding, but those flaws become a part of the poem’s integrity, so I still feel that those poems are descendants of God. But if a poem isn’t even good enough to be a poem, I don’t think it’s descended from God: [If] there is no “I” [as in Martin Buber’s I and Thou], there is no God. The ‘Me’ talking about ‘Me’—that’s not enough.”

(via)

THE GIFT
To pull the metal splinter from my palm
my father recited a story in a low voice.
I watched his lovely face and not the blade.
Before the story ended, he’d removed
the iron sliver I thought I’d die from.

I can’t remember the tale,
but hear his voice still, a well
of dark water, a prayer.
And I recall his hands,
two measures of tenderness
he laid against my face,
the flames of discipline
he raised above my head.

Had you entered that afternoon
you would have thought you saw a man
planting something in a boy’s palm,
a silver tear, a tiny flame.
Had you followed that boy
you would have arrived here,
where I bend over my wife’s right hand.

Look how I shave her thumbnail down
so carefully she feels no pain.
Watch as I lift the splinter out.
I was seven when my father
took my hand like this,
and I did not hold that shard
between my fingers and think,
Metal that will bury me,
christen it Little Assassin,
Ore Going Deep for My Heart.
And I did not lift up my wound and cry,
Death visited here!
I did what a child does
when he’s given something to keep.
I kissed my father.

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