Seeing the grey-faced matador, at the barrier
Just below us, straightening his bent sword
And vomiting with fear. And the horn
That bid itself inside the blowfly belly
Of the toppled picador punctured
What was waiting for you. Spain
Was the land of your dreams: the dust-red cadaver
You dared not wake with, the puckering amputations
No literature course had glamorised.
The juju land behind your African lips.
Spain was what you tried to wake up from
And could not. I see you, in moonlight,
Walking the empty wharf at Alicante
Like a soul waiting for the ferry,
A new soul, still not understanding,
Thinking it is still your honeymoon
In the happy world, with your whole life waiting,
Happy, and all your poems still to be found.
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España te atemorizaba. España
Donde yo me sentía como en casa. La luz cruda,
[sanguinolenta,
Los rostros color anchoa, los perfiles negroafricanos
De todas las cosas te atemorizaban. En cierta manera,
Tu educación escolar había obviado España.
La reja de hierro forjado, la muerte y el tambor árabe.
Desconocías el idioma, tu alma estaba vacía
De signos, y la luz fundidora
Te agostaba la sangre. El Bosco
Te tendió su pata de araña y tú la asiste
Tímida como una colegiala estadounidense.
Observaste detenidamente la mueca fúnebre de Goya
Y la reconociste, y luego retrocediste estremeciéndote
Igual que tus poemas en su escalofrío, igual que tu
[pánico
Volvía a aferrarse al college, a Estados Unidos.
Como buenos turistas asistimos a una corrida,
Toros aturdidos, sacrificados en una torpe carnicería,
El matador de cara gris, en la barrera
Justo debajo de nosotros, enderezando el estoque
Y vomitando su miedo. Y el cuerno
Que fue a ocultarse en el vientre de moscardón
Del picador caído ya perforó entonces
Lo que aguardaba por ti. España
Era la tierra de tus sueños: el cadáver rojo-polvo
Con el que temías despertar, los costurones de las
[amputaciones
Que ningún curso de literatura había podido
[embellecer.
La tierra del yuyu tras tus labios africanos.
España era aquello de lo que intentabas despertar
Y no podías. Aún puedo verte, bajo la luz de la luna,
Paseando por el muelle vacío de Alicante
Igual que un alma esperando el ferry,
Una nueva alma que aún no comprende lo que le pasa,
Pensando que sigues en tu luna de miel
En el mundo feliz, y que tienes toda la vida por
[delante,
Feliz, y todos tus poemas por hallar.
Spain frightened you. Spain
Where I felt at borne. The blood-raw light,
The oiled anchovy faces, the African
Black edges to everything, frightened you.
Your schooling had somehow neglected Spain.
The wrought-iron grille, death and the Arab drum.
You did not know the language, your soul was empty
Of the signs, and the welding light
Made your blood shrivel. Bosch
Held out a spidery hand and you took it
Timidly, a bobby-sox American.
You saw right down to the Goya funeral grin
And recognised it, and recoiled
As your poems winced into chill, as your panic
Clutched back towards college America.
So we sat as tourists at the bullfight
Watching bewildered bulls awkwardly butchered,
Seeing the grey-faced matador, at the barrier
Just below us, straightening his bent sword
And vomiting with fear. And the horn
That bid itself inside the blowfly belly
Of the toppled picador punctured
What was waiting for you. Spain
Was the land of your dreams: the dust-red cadaver
You dared not wake with, the puckering amputations
No literature course had glamorised.
The juju land behind your African lips.
Spain was what you tried to wake up from
And could not. I see you, in moonlight,
Walking the empty wharf at Alicante
Like a soul waiting for the ferry,
A new soul, still not understanding,
Thinking it is still your honeymoon
In the happy world, with your whole life waiting,
Happy, and all your poems still to be found.
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