Siesta by Antonio Machado

In Memory of Abel Martin

While the fish of fire circles up and down,
next to the cypress below the supreme indigo,
and Eros, the blind child, floats in white stone,
and ivory song of green cicadas echoes,
resounds and throbs in branches of the elm,
let us honor the Lord—
the black imprint of his kindly hand,
who ordered silence into clamoring discord.

To God of distances and of absence,
our anchor in the sea, the open sea…
He frees us from the world—omnipresence—
and finds a way for us to stroll easily.

With shadow filling and overfilling our glass,
and his heart never full, let us praise
and honor the Lord who made the Nothingness,
and carved out reason into Faith.

From: http://www.versedaily.org/siesta.shtml

Date: 2003 (translated)

By: Antonio Machado (1875-1939)

Translated by: Willis Barnstone (1927- )

Tags: 2003, antonio machado, poetry, siesta, while the fish of fire circles up and down, willis barnstone