RAY BRADBURY:
"A POEM WRITTEN ON LEARNING THAT SHAKESPEARE AND CERVANTES BOTH DIED ON THE SAME DAY"
Great Shakespeare lost, Cervantes gone
The sun at noon goes down. The dawn
Refuses light. Time holds its breath
At this coincidence of death
Then can it be? and is it so
That these twin gods to darkness go
All in a day! and none to stop
The harvesting of this fell crop
Each in its field, and each so bright
They, burning, hurled away the night.
Yet night returns to seize its due,
One Spirit Spout? No! Death takes two.
First one. The world goes wry from lack
Then two! tips world to balance back.
Two Comet strikes within a week,
First Spain, the dumbstruck England�s cheek.
The world grinds mute in dreads and fears
Antarctica melts down to tears,
And Caesars ghosts erupted, rise
All bleeding Amazons from eyes,
An age has ended, yet must stay
As witness to a brutal day
When witless God left us alone
By deathing Will, then Spanish clone.
Who dares to try and gauge each pen
We shall not see such twins again.
Shakespeare is lost, Cervantes dead?
The conduits of God are bled
The sun at noon goes down. The dawn
Refuses light. Time holds its breath
At this coincidence of death
Then can it be? and is it so
That these twin gods to darkness go
All in a day! and none to stop
The harvesting of this fell crop
Each in its field, and each so bright
They, burning, hurled away the night.
Yet night returns to seize its due,
One Spirit Spout? No! Death takes two.
First one. The world goes wry from lack
Then two! tips world to balance back.
Two Comet strikes within a week,
First Spain, the dumbstruck England�s cheek.
The world grinds mute in dreads and fears
Antarctica melts down to tears,
And Caesars ghosts erupted, rise
All bleeding Amazons from eyes,
An age has ended, yet must stay
As witness to a brutal day
When witless God left us alone
By deathing Will, then Spanish clone.
Who dares to try and gauge each pen
We shall not see such twins again.
Shakespeare is lost, Cervantes dead?
The conduits of God are bled
And gone the Light, and shut the clay
Two Titans gone within a day,
Two felled by one sure stroke of death,
Christ gapes his wounds, God stops his breath.
And we are staggered by twin falls
The vastness of the day appalls
As if a tribunal of Kings
From Caesars down to our Royal Things,
A pageant of rich royalty
Were drowned in Time�s obscenity.
Who ordered thus: �Two giants � die.�
First one and then our other eye
God shut the great, then greatest dream
One not enough? No, it would seem
A void half full if Shakespeare, done
Went down to doom at sunset�s gun.
So then lamenting, then with laugh,
God seized and filled the other half.
Cervantes pulled across the sill
To heart of Comet brim and fill.
God sent both forth, twin stars whose fire
Birthed whales and beauteous beasts for hire
And long years since we beg for rides
Where Cervantes plus Shakespeare hides
Their fall? knocked echoes round the Stage
And still we reckon our outrage
Because where is the sense in this
Our left hand and our right we miss
Which clapped together made applause
For God and Primal Cosmic Cause.
But Cervantes and Bard strewn cold
Two wild Dreams in one dumb soil mold?
Let all the echoes flow in tides
Where comets are their flowering brides
And Cervantes and bawdy Will
Two Titans gone within a day,
Two felled by one sure stroke of death,
Christ gapes his wounds, God stops his breath.
And we are staggered by twin falls
The vastness of the day appalls
As if a tribunal of Kings
From Caesars down to our Royal Things,
A pageant of rich royalty
Were drowned in Time�s obscenity.
Who ordered thus: �Two giants � die.�
First one and then our other eye
God shut the great, then greatest dream
One not enough? No, it would seem
A void half full if Shakespeare, done
Went down to doom at sunset�s gun.
So then lamenting, then with laugh,
God seized and filled the other half.
Cervantes pulled across the sill
To heart of Comet brim and fill.
God sent both forth, twin stars whose fire
Birthed whales and beauteous beasts for hire
And long years since we beg for rides
Where Cervantes plus Shakespeare hides
Their fall? knocked echoes round the Stage
And still we reckon our outrage
Because where is the sense in this
Our left hand and our right we miss
Which clapped together made applause
For God and Primal Cosmic Cause.
But Cervantes and Bard strewn cold
Two wild Dreams in one dumb soil mold?
Let all the echoes flow in tides
Where comets are their flowering brides
And Cervantes and bawdy Will
Do windmill fight our hopes uphill
And rouse us up in nightmare bed
To cry: Quixote, Hamlet, dead?
In one fell day? Get off! Get. Go!
Such funerals I will not know.
Their graves, their stones, these I refuse.
Lend me their books, show me their Muse.
By end of day or, latest, week,
I bid Cervantes/Shakespeare speak
To brim my heart, to fill my head
With what? Good Don. Fine Lear. Not dead. Not dead!
Bibliography:
Ray Bradbury (2002): I live By The Invisible: New & Selected Poems. Clare: Salmon Poetry, pp. 13-15.
And rouse us up in nightmare bed
To cry: Quixote, Hamlet, dead?
In one fell day? Get off! Get. Go!
Such funerals I will not know.
Their graves, their stones, these I refuse.
Lend me their books, show me their Muse.
By end of day or, latest, week,
I bid Cervantes/Shakespeare speak
To brim my heart, to fill my head
With what? Good Don. Fine Lear. Not dead. Not dead!
Bibliography:
Ray Bradbury (2002): I live By The Invisible: New & Selected Poems. Clare: Salmon Poetry, pp. 13-15.
�POEMA ESCRITO AL SABER QUE SHAKESPEARE Y CERVANTES MURIERON EL MISMO D�A� (RAY BRADBURY)
El gran Shakespeare desaparecido, Cervantes fallecido
y el sol que descinde al mediod�a. El amanecer
rechaza la luz. El tiempo contiene el aliento
ante esta coincidencia de muerte
�y puede ser?, �c�mo puede ser
que estos dioses mellizos se marchen a la oscuridad
los dos el mismo d�a!, y que ninguno detenga
la siega de esta cruel cosecha
cada una en su campo, y cada una tan brillante,
ambas, ardiendo, alejaron la noche.
Aunque lanoche regresa para apropiarse de sus derechos,
�A Liberar un Esp�ritu? �No! La Muerte se lleva dos.
Primero uno. El mundo anda desnivelado
�pues dos! Y el mundo entonces se vuelve a equilibrar.
Dos choques de Cometas en na semana,
primero Espa�a, luego el boquiabierto rostro de Inglaterra.
El mundo se queda mudo de p�nico y miedo,
la Ant�rtida se derrite en l�grimas,
y los fantasmas de los C�sares violentados surgen
como amazonas de ojos ensangrentados,
una edad ha concluido, aunque debe quedar
como testigo de un d�a brutal
en el que el absurdo Dios nos dej� solos
al dar muerte a Qilliam, y despu�s al clon espa�ol.
�Qui�n se atreve a intentar evaluar esas plumas?
Ya no volveremos a ver tales mellizos de nuevo.
Shakespeare ha desaparecido, �y Cervanes muert?
Los conductos de Dios est�n desangrados
y sin Luz, y terminado el barro,
pues dos Titanes se han ido en un solo d�a,
los dos derribados por un certero golpe de la muerte,
Cristo contempla con asombro sus heridas. Dios deja de respirar.
Y nosotros nos quedamos consternados por ca�das mellizas,
la inmensidad del d�a horroriza
como si un tribunal de Reyes,
desde los C�sares hasta nuestros Asuntos Reales,
un desfile de lujosa realeza
se ahogara en la obscenidad del Tiempo.
Alguien as� lo orden�: �Que mueran dos giganges�.
primero un ojo y luego el otro,
Dios cerr� el grande, �entonces el m�s grande sue�o
no es bastante? No, parecer�a
un vac�o meido lleno si Shakespeare, perdido
descendiera a la muerte justo alpistoletazo del ocaso.
As� pues lamentando, despu�s riendo,
Dios cogi� y llen� la otra mitad.
Cervantes avanz� por el umbral
para llenar y colmar el coraz�n del Cometa.
Dios los envi� a los dos, estrellas gemelas cuyo fuego
alumbr� ballenas y hermosas bestias de alquiler
y muchos a�os ya suspirando por los paseos
donde Cervantes m�s Shakespeare esconden
su ca�da. Ecos golpeteados por el Escenario
y aun as� imaginamos nuestra atrocidad
porque donde se encuentra el sentido de esto
echamos de menos nuestra mano izquierda y derecha
que aplaud�an juntas
a Dios y a la Primera Causa C�smica.
Pero Cervantes y el Bardo helados
�dos Sue�os salvajes en un mudo molde de tierra?
Que todos los ecos fluyan con las mareas
donde los cometas sean sus novias florecientes
y Cervantes y el imp�dico Will
disputen nuestras esperanzas cuesta arriba
y nos despierten del espantoso sue�o
para gritar: ��Quijote, Hamlet, muertos?
�En un aciago d�a? �D�jalo!, venga. �Vamos!�.
No ver� tales funerales.
Sus tumbas, sus l�pidas, las rechazo.
Prestadme sus libros, mostradme sus Musas.
Al final del d�a o, a m�s tardar, de la semana,
ruego a Cervantes/Shakespeare que hable
para colmar mi coraz�n, para llenar mi cabeza
�de qu�? Del Gran Don. Del buen Lear. No han muerto. �No han muerto!
23 de Abril de 1980
Referencia: Ray Bradbury, Poes�a completa, Madrid, C�tedra, 2013, p�gs. 977-981 [Edici�n, Introducci�n y traducci�n de Jes�s Isa�as G�mez L�pez]
