Tags
1923, Buenos Aires, EBOOKS, Graphic Arts, Jorge Louis Borges, Phil Gennuso Arts, POETRY, Translations
The Streets
The streets of Buenos Aires
they are the entry to my soul.
Not the bustling streets of the city,
filled with hustle and commerce,
but the sweet streets of the suburbs,
filled with trees and sunsets,
and those streets even further out,
beyond the sheltering woodlands,
where austere little houses barely venture,
profoundly hindered by immortal distances,
they will never get lost in that deep vision
made up of a great plain and even greater sky.
They are for all the greedy souls
a promise of fortune,
for under their protection many lives are joined
ending the seclusion of houses,
and through them with the heroic will of deception,
walks our hope.
Towards the four cardinal points
the streets are unfolding like buckets
I hope in my verses
those flags are flying upright.
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Las Calles
Las calles de Buenos Aires
ya son la entraña de mi alma.
No las calles enérgicas
molestades de prisas y ajetreos,
sino la dulce calle de arrabal
enternecida de árboles y ocasos
y aquellas màs afuera
ajenas de piadošos arbolados
donde austeras casitas apenas se aventuran
hostilizadas por immortales distancias
a entrometerse en la honda visión
hecha de gran llanura y mayor cielo.
Son todas ellas para el codieiosode almas
una promesa de ventura
pues a su amparo hermánanse tantas vidas
desunindiendo la reclusión de las casas
y por ellas con voluntad heroica de engaño
anda nuestre esperanza.
Hacia los cuatro puntos cardinales
se van desplegando como bauderas las calles
ojalá en mis verses enhiestos
vuelen esas banderas.
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Two Thousand Twenty-Three, marks the 100 year anniversary of the publication of the first published work by the iconic Argentine author, Jorge Luis Borges! In Nineteen Twenty-Three, he published 300 copies of a small volume of poetry called Fervor De Buenos Aires, containing 46 poems and 60 pages.The very first peom in that collection, Las Calles, is presented here in my post.
Interestingly enough in Nineteen Sixty-Nine he published a new version with substantial changes, additions and subtractions. I may refer to newer versions, but I am sticking with the original because I am very fond of the first works of subsequently accomplished authors.
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Las Calles is a beautiful short poem in my opinion and a great keynote for the rest of the volume. I actually prefer this version over the revised version published in Nineteen Sixty-Nine. I think it accurately reflects the world of the poet when he returned to Argentina in Nineteen Twenty-One, at the age of 22, after having spent the previous 7 years abroad. He grew up in Buenos Aires spending his first 14 years there. This volume is his return song, and this poem sounds the first opening notes.
The poem flows through four stages, movements if you will. The poet conveniently divides them into four sentences, three of the sentences grouped together, the final sentence, seperated, serving as a coda.
The opening couplet states quite clearly, this is where the poet belongs, the streets are part of him, implicitly, he is happy to return.
In the next movement, the poem makes quite clear, the streets that Borges loves are not the busy, bustling commercial streets we think of today as city life, but the streets a bit further from the city, the suburbs he calls them. And even the ones further out, under open skies, that many city dwellers might never venture out to see. To me this represents the poet’s imagination, his vision, his willingness to go beyond his normal borders. And we have to remember at the beginning of the 20th century the outskirts of many cities, including those in America, often still had some remaining farmlands, open spaces and meadows, before they became developed and filled with city streets and avenues.
The third and final movement of this section is somewhat more complex. They are for the greedy souls, the poet writes, those looking for a fortune. Perhaps that would be us dreaming of becoming a rock star or a billionaire. For he goes on to say, he realizes these are deceptions but they also are a source of hope that helps to keep us going. Dreams don’t have to be realistic to be inspiring.
The last segment, the coda, the wrap up, helps to explain the contradictions and negativity of the third sentence. Here we see the poet reassert his true dream, his true hopes, to become an artist, an author, whose visions are straight and true. It frames the greed and false hopes of youth into a true calling, one that stands up straight on all points of the compass.
This is what Jorge Luis Borges wrote when he was about twenty three years old, on returning to his homeland, his place of birth. And as the rest of his life demonstrated, he lived up to that hope and fulfilled his true dream.
That is what I love about this first poem, from this first published work, in its original, unchanged format! I hope you enjoy it as much as I have! I personally found it to be inspiring.
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In the days and weeks ahead I intend to publish more of these wonderful poems with translations and illustrations. Eventually I will publish a small Ebook, probably with a selection of 20-25 of the original poems from 1923, some with comments as above, some with just illustrations and the translation. I am very excited about this project becasue while there are excellent translations of the 1969 revised edition, there are no translations I could find of the original. So I think it will be well worth the effort!
Stay tuned! And thanks for your continued support!
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