Translation:The Black Heralds (1918)/The Weary Rings

by César Vallejo

 
There’s the desire to return, to love, to remain present,
and there’s the desire to die, fought by two
opposite streams that may never converge.

There’s the desire: of a great kiss that shrouds Life,
that ends in the africa of a burning agony,
suicide!

There’s the desire to... not to desire. Lord;
it’s you I’m pointing at, with a deicidal finger,
there’s the desire to not have had a heart.

Spring returns, returns and it’ll go away. And God,
curved in time, recurs, and passes: he passes
with the Universe’s spine upon his shoulders.

When, my temples beat their forlorn drum...
when I’m pained by the dream engraved in a dagger,
there’s the desire to remain stuck in this verse.