Patricia Guzmán

Born 1960 in Caracas, where she lives. Studied literature and journalism; directed the weekly magazine and literary page of the newspaper El Universal. As a poet has published De mí, lo oscuro, 1987, and Cantos y oficios, 1997; El poema del esposo, 1999 and 2000; La boda, 2001; Con la ala alta, Obra poetica reunida 1987- 2003. She is an example of a writer who prefers to look – and her gaze is penetrating – at daylight aspects of reality.

Spanish Text

THE HUSBAND'S POEM, I
                                                to Nicolás Bianco

 

As for me I don't mind being pleasant and serving
As for me I don't mind being good for keeping
(I don't mind them saying a good woman is good luck)
I don't mind being the weaker half
I don't mind having to ask heaven for favors
I need nourishment and I need greetings
I know I'm not fully awake
I know I'm not secure against denials
(I haven't succeeded in slowing down my eyes)

I don't mind having a husband

(He has the truth)
(He has a feeling for good)
Inner delights are those of married love

But you don't know it
You can't tell anyone either
(You are asleep)
The good husband has to watch over your sleep
The good husband stays awake all night
(He doesn't know he's awake)
(He doesn't know every man is a church)
(He is owed a special gift)
(The angel, moved, has confessed to him its own sins)

When the husband sits at the table, you ask him to eat well
When the husband sits at the table, you ask him not to cry
When the husband says goodbye, you bless him
(It's always good to pray for them a little)

The husband never knows he is your husband
Either you have a husband or you're a wife (both together is impossible)
If you're a wife your mind wanders                                        

You don't talk much to the husband
(You mustn't say things out loud)
Call, yes
Call
Look hard at the rose while you speak to your husband
Look hard at the rose before going out into the street
Look hard at the rose when you get up

I don't have to know when my husband gets up and goes to bed
I haven't been able to make him talk to himself
He's distracted, often, by the sound of his own heart

If they tell you your husband's dying, don't believe it
Marriages are always made in heaven

The husband drinks from a broken cup
The husband never cuts his lips
The husband's lips are for you to smile with

No one else can live in the husband's house
(Put the birds to sleep: that's your first duty)

The husband should never fast (it would break his bridge to the sky)

Stop it, bird!
(You shout at the bird if you have a husband)
Why didn't you tell me before that the heart's space was narrow?
Why didn't you tell me before that hell's light could be good for your eyes?
Why didn't you tell me before that it wasn't a sin to be tired?

 

Today they notified me that the husband is ill
I went and bought myself a cup
The cup calms me
My husband washes my cup
How, then, can he die?

If the husband dies he's not your husband, he's a rose lying on its face

Never go to a church to pray for his health
It's better to take flowers to the saints (they understand)

As for you, go home
Ask the birds to fly from now on more slowly around you
(You, for your part, remember you should eat a little more slowly)
Your heart will still be on the left
                                                                                                                       
No one will believe you when you say you suffer a lot when you dream
No one will believe you when you say it hurts you to wake up
(The husband never notices)

No one will believe you when you say you have no reprehensible ambitions

I'm not good to my husband
(He knows how to govern pleasure and pain)
I'm not good to my husband
(He doesn't know the distance between good and evil)
My soul isn't prepared for tranquility

(He can feel delight)
I like empty cups, they relieve me of myself
(He has the patience to suffer)

Sleeping is not an easy task
Next day you are still there
Next day the wish for his wellbeing burns in me
Next day everything remains hidden
Next day people go by with no noise, words are impossible to them

I have to wake up to join the procession

Something in me hasn't finished being born

My husband looks after the garden of my house
He takes care of it and I look at it, I look at it a lot
My husband doesn't know that a garden is a garden
I'm going to tell him that all roses are white
I'm going to put a golden rose in his hands

The husband doesn't learn to pray
The husband's mouth is clean

My dream stayed awake
My dream kept its eyes turned upward
The tear from the sky falls in the husband's mouth

I have to join the procession

"Because Helen, who knew the handsomest men, abandoned her husband, the best of them all..."

Don't kiss the husband, you may lose your voice
Don't let the white goats go to sleep on the altar

You have to fill yourself with what you look at
(It'll be from ignorance and not from malice)
Who will heal me?
Heal me, not of any lack

 

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