by Miguel de Unamuno (trans. Kate Lynch)
On these dreary afternoons,
when the hours delay in slipping away
and are leaving behind traces of tedium,
the sole cure, sorrowful star!
in seeing oneself cast out
is to take refuge in the abyss of memories
which never were.
To dream of a happy past,
a beautiful dream!
a dream by which lost years may be recaptured.
To return to live in a time away,
in the sacred sphere
of infinite freedom,
a place to dream of what never was.
No, not with Rosa, it was with Margarita
close your eyes, effortlessly!
to the truth,
to the all-powerful, unrivaled truth,
how doable it is to build a new nest,
iridescent clouds appearing there
cradling eternity’s aura.
Was it that way? Who is to say…!
The vessel ploughs through the endless ocean,
in whose glaze,
unchanging,
not a mark of the ship’s errant path is to be seen
nor a trace of its wake.
No, but it is not
the same vessel, whether, fast or slow,
which hangs onto the waves it has crossed,
waves that were merely
the oceans’ dreams.
Do we not carry in this vessel perhaps
what we may dream
and existed in dreams alone?
From a mirage the sail fills
and the wake is erased,
then the waves, the breeze,
smiles of the seas and heavens,
the deserted ship fills with yearnings and knows not where to sail.
And on its journey, short or long,
these dreams are its charge:
what we dream is our treasure,
our wealth,
the rich hopes we deserve,
dreams abound,
and dreamers of only greatness.
Remember, then, or you may dream it, my soul,
-fantasy is your eternal sustenance-,
that which never was;
gather strength from your musings,
for this is living, and all else is ruin.