Photo: Muir Vidler

This Spanish Translation has been done by a great Spanish friend Dr Natalia Carbajosa and the author is highly grateful for this act of friendship and kindness.

Read Biography

Sobre el puente triste de Southwark

Camino de noche sobre el puente triste de Southwark
Bajo farolas que a tocarme se inclinan
Mi mente es una con el aire libre donde juguetea el espacio
Y dejo a las nocturnas luces dividir mi sombra en tres

Moviéndose mientras camino y juega el viento húmedo
Con las olas y el agua excesiva ahí abajo
Sobre la que luces urbanas casi irreales crean
Peces plateados de luz pirueteando rítmicos y leves

Mientras aspiro el aire como si la vida se reflejara
En esta nada absoluta y salvaje que tan sólo
Se alcanza en un estado de asombrada y herida melancolía
Y pienso en mis hijos, mi familia que me espera.

Go to Top

Original English Version
On Soulful Southwark Bridge

I walk on soulful Southwark Bridge at night
Under the street lamps that lower themselves to touch me
My mind equates the free air where it plays the space
And I let the night lights divide my shadow into three

That move as I walk while the wet wind plays
With the waves and water bellow appearing fulsome
On which the city night lights create almost unreal
Silver fishes of lights playing rhythmic light lounge

While I inhale the air as though life has mirrored itself
Into this wild absoluted nothingness that can only
Be reached in a state of wonder wounded melancholy
And I think of my children and family waiting ahead

Go to Top

Avenida de luces en octubre

Respondiendo a un solo impulso certero descendí
Del autobús una parada antes de mi destino

Y comencé a pasear como si tuviera algo
Sereno y floreciente que contemplar con embeleso

Avancé hasta el puente- avenida de luces en octubre
Dejando que el viento húmedo pintara obras invisibles

En el lienzo de mi rostro, soplara en mi pelo con
Un vívido frescor que algo mágico extrajera

De mí mismo y me torné en casual visitante
Presto a retener las melodías de estos recuerdos

Atesorados y a regarlos como geranios diamantinos
A la espera de germinar en cristales de silencio

Paseando por el puente miré al río aún muy joven
Tembloroso donde el viento recortaba un lienzo vivo

De tridimensional danza sobre la superficie del agua
concediendo a unos artistas comunales pergeñar

La obra de arte del día: las sombras de los edificios
El cielo salpicado de nubes ligeras, blancas y lanudas

Las gaviotas, los puentes y las olas entrechocadas
Ondulándose y las barcas y navíos con ellas.

Habiendo llevado todo eso a mi áureo ser continué
Caminando hasta el vientre de la ciudad donde trabajo

Mas algo llevaba en mi esencia con una fragancia
Un toque áureo de algo que pudiera llamarse casi ser vivo

Dentro que latía y cantaba sublime como el Serengeti
Y ahí permanece a tu alcance para ser llevado de paseo.

Go to Top

Original English Version
October Avenue of Lights

On a sudden response to a surely sole urge I
Got off the bus one step before my destination

And began walking as if ahead I had something
Serene and thriving waiting to be witnessed spellbound

I stepped onto the Bridge-an October avenue of lights
Letting the water blown wet wind paint invisible works

On the canvas of my face, blowing my hair with
A live thriving coolness that brings something magical

Out of oneself and I became a welcome passing through
Visitor who would keep the melodies of these memories

Treasured and water these as though they were diamond
Geraniums waiting to propagate into spectacles of silence

As I walked on the bridge I looked at the fulsome-young
Trembling river where wind played out a living-dancing

Three dimensional canvas on the surface of water
And allowed an array of communal artists to play out

An art work of the day: the shadows of the buildings
The sky splattered with fluffy white light clouds

The sea gulls, the bridges and the ever chasing waves
Rippling out and the boats and ships all joined in.

Having taken all that into my areal being I carried on
Walking into the belly of the city where I work

Yet I carried something in my essence that had a fragrance
An areal touch of something that felt like almost a living thing

Inside that kept beating and singing a Serengeti sublime
And here it remains open to be taken for a ride at your leisure

Go to Top

El reino áureo del todo

Tras la lluvia se abre la ciudad bajo el sol del mediodía
Habla con la letra centelleante de los cielos reflejados

Me torno parte de ese espejo temporal en la tierra
Y emprendo un paseo de espejo adoptando la dualidad

Que con sencillez germina de la lluvia y el sol
Donde todo es metáfora de unión

Mis pasos mi mirada de espejo y el trasiego
De los otros paseantes de pronto se tornan uno

Sigo caminando en el espejo ya sin peso
Leve como mi reflejo entro en el reino áureo del todo.

Go to Top

Original English Version
A Realm of Areal Whole

Just after rain the city slabs under mid day's sun
Speaks with sparkling letters of reflected skies

I become a part of that temporal mirror on the floor
And undertake a mirror walk taking in the duality

That simply germinates out of the rain and sun
Where everything becomes a metaphor of togetherness

My walk, observation, mirror walk and the spread of
People and their goings on suddenly come to be one

I carry on walking the mirror walk without any weight
Light as my reflection enter a realm of areal whole

Go to Top

Entre dos orillas

Entre dos orillas
Forma mi espacio una tercera
Donde reúno mis canciones de silencio
Y un código sagrado cultivado
En la profundidad de las cosas en perpetuo florecer

Entre dos orillas
Revestido de humana ingenuidad
En el flujo constante de la corriente-gente
Y el río al que Támesis llamamos
Canto la corriente de las tres orillas

Quizá varíe el tempo de día o de noche
Mas espléndidas, nosotras continuamos
Juntas la Orilla Humana y la Divina
Y la mía expandiéndose en las dos y a un tiempo sola
Donde a todos os invito a nadar

Entre dos orillas
Voy creando la orilla futura
Desde vuestro presente y pasado
Con más de lo que me brindáis
Y recibís más de lo que existe.

Go to Top

Original English Version
Between Two Strands

Standing between two strands
I find my space forming a third
Where I gather my silent songs
And a scripture code from a cultivating
Depth of things unfolding perpetually

Standing between the Strand
Shaped up by human ingenuity
In constant flow of people-current
And the she-river we call Thames
I sing the current of three stands

In days and nights tempo may change
But our going goes on gorgeously
Human Strand and God's one together
And mine expand in both yet stands alone
Where I invite you all to come and swim

Standing between two strands
I create your future's strand
Out of your present and past
With more than what you give me
And you get back more than what is there

Go to Top

En Bally Marrey

Se detuvo el tren
En Bally Marrey
Nublando el aire
El fragor envuelve a los viajeros
Corriendo hacia el vagón

Parapetado tras
La ventana del tren
Busqué algún rostro
Que con una piedra
Guardara semejanza

Se alejó el tren del andén
Nublando el aire
Como hojas de otoño
El fragor se instala
Me dispongo a salir
Sin ser consciente
De la piedra sepultada en mi corazón.

Go to Top

Original English Version
At Bally Marrey

The train stopped
At Bally Marrey
Clouding the air
Noises gather people
Rushing to get on board

From the detachment
Of the train window
I looked for any face
That seems close enough
Just to relate a stone

The train moved
From the platform
Clouding the air
Noises settle like autumn leaves
I gather myself to go
Without knowing
The stone stoned in my heart

Go to Top

Entre el silencio y los sonidos

El jarrón incoloro del silencio infinito contiene las flores
Flores de todos los sonidos, palabras y música que hacemos
Nosotros los objetos: humanos, animales, microbios y cosas

Flores finitas en jarrón infinito así se muestran nuestras creaciones
Ínfimas, mas ¡qué brillo en el espacio irradian!
La belleza de las cosas nuestras flores del ser y del vivir

Sobre el océano sin agua de la nada y el espacio
El agua-silencio sostiene nuestro nadar, madrigal y melodía
Criaturas marinas nadamos viendo a nuestras flores centellear

Entre el silencio infinito y los sonidos finitos vivimos
Como si los sonidos alas ofrecieran para el vuelo y el canto de luz
Mientras cobija el silencio nuestra reunión o descanso

Para poder crear las flores de nuestro cántico y cantar
Aquí está el cántico de nuestros sonidos y las flores de nuestro vivir
¡con qué fulgor destellan en el jarrón infinito del silencio!

Go to Top

Original English Version
Between Silence and Sounds

The colourless vase of infinite silence holds the flowers
Flowers of all the sounds, words and music that we make
We the things: humans, animals, microbes and things

Finite flowers on an infinite vase our creations stand
Tiny may be, but how radiantly they sparkle in space!
The beauty of things our flowers of being and living

On the non hydraulic ocean of nothingness and space
Silence-water supports our swims, madrigals and melodies
Marine creatures we swim watching our flowers sparkle

Between the infinite silence and finite sounds we live
As though sounds offer us wings to fly and sing light
While silence offers us home to rest, roost and gather

So that we could create the flowers of our songs and sing
Here are the songs of our sounds and the flowers of our living
How brilliantly they radiate on the infinite vase of silence!

Mi padre caminando

Mi padre caminando con sandalias de madera
Que del suelo le alejaban
Caminaba unos centímetros más alto
Escrutando las cosas como un turista
Repasando los dedos las cuentas del rosario
Raudos a la espalda como si algo le urgiese

Dondequiera que estuviese siempre
Se apostaba su centro más allá de lo real
Caminaba propagando el sonido de sandalias
Que se unía a las cuentas de los recuerdos
Que yo atesoro como un rosario invisible

Mi padre caminando por el patio
En el aire y el espacio tenuemente iluminados
Y secos del otoño inmóvil en la ventana
Tan brillante
Piedras de sonidos en continuo desprender de sus sandalias
Al pozo de mi mente
Tan lejanas y tan tranquilizadoramente cálidas, cercanas

Mi padre caminando con sandalias de madera
Bebiendo a veces su hookah
Especiado por el cielo-pensamiento
Que albergaba su cabeza
Testimonio de varios hombres a un tiempo
Con todo dejaba mi padre el sonido de sus sandalias
Recorriendo su tiempo y su vida en los míos

Mi padre caminando con sandalias de madera
A veces escucho ese sonido
En mis pisadas que desaparecen
Me paro con el rosario de sonidos de los recuerdos
Recuerdo su barba blanca y su blanca sonrisa de nieve roja
Abriéndose como el sol tras un cielo de lluvia.

Go to Top

Original English Version

My Father Walking

My Father walking in his wooden sandals
That separated him from the earth
A few inches taller he walked about
Examining things as though he was a tourist
His fingers going through the beads of the rosary
Fast at his back as if he was in hurry

His centre wherever it was
Always focussed beyond anything real
He walked spreading the sounds of his wooden sandals
That joined the beads of memories
That I hold as a rosary invisible

My father walking there at the yard
Dry softly lit early autumn air and space
Stood still on the window
That is so bright
The wooden sandals go on dropping the stones of sounds
Into the well of my mind
So distant yet so reassuringly warm and near

My father walking in his wooden sandals
At times drinking his hookah
That spiced up the thought-sky
That he carried in his head
Which could substantiate a few men at a time
Yet my father left the sounds of his wooden sandals
That rang his walk time and life time in mine

My father walking in his wooden sandals
At times I hear his sounds
Into my disappearing footsteps
I stand back holding the rosary of sounds of memories
I remember his white beard and red snow white smile
Widening like the shine in a cloudy sky after rain

Go to Top

Our great appreciation goes to Natalia for taking on this hard and almost impossible task for Poet's Letter Magazine! Thank you Natalia!

About the Translator: Natalia Carbajosa who is the  Writer in Spain for Poet's Letter Magazine

Dr Natalia Carbajosa

Natalia Carbajosa was born in 1971 in the south of Spain (Cádiz) ,and studied English at the University of Salamanca, obtaining a Doctorate on Shakespeare studies in 1999. From 1995 to 1998 she was co-editor of the literary magazine "Parásito", together with other university students. Since 1999 I teach English at the University of Cartagena.

She has also taught English Literature at the National Distance Education University (UNED). Poetry books: "Los puentes sumergidos" ("The Submerged Bridges"), 2000; "Pronóstico" ("Forecast"), 2005; "Los reinos y las horas" ("The Kingdoms and the Hours"), 2006. Short stories: "Patologías" ("Pathologies"), 2005.

She collaborates with translations and research articles in national and foreign magazines on literature, theatre and cinema, and has participated in seminars on Renaissance studies and contemporary Angloindian and South African literature.

Some of her poems have been translated into Romanian and published in a Canadian magazine. Natalia has translated a great deal of contemporary Spanish Poetry in English which have been featured in Poet's Letter. She led a team of Spanish poets at the 3rd London Poetry Festival 2007.