The suffering of people, how hard it is to watch. The pictures of Gaza fill my eyes with tears and make my heart heavy. The news from Ukraine leaves me almost hopeless. In a few hours, I will open the door to our filled fridge, which is right now overflowing with vegetables and fruits and I will start preparing dinner.
I find society sometimes so disturbing I want to scream loud and long. Surprisingly a couple of minutes later I laugh when I hear something funny. Perhaps that keeps me sane in a world that has gone mad.
I try so hard to forget pain-filled faces and misery, but suffering is part of our world, and I am not the only one who finds it disturbing. I refuse to not know. If people have to live it, I can read about it. If there would only be an end in sight.
How difficult it can be to be human in a world that is not humane.
A man walks by with a stick of bread on his shoulder.
Am I going to write, after that, about my double?
Another sits, scratches, extracts a louse from his armpit, kills it.
How dare one speak about psychoanalysis?
Another has entered my chest with a stick in hand.
To talk then about Socrates with the doctor?
A cripple passes by holding a child’s hand.
After that I’m going to read André Breton?
Another trembles from cold, coughs, spits blood.
Will it ever be possible to allude to the profound I?
Another searches in the muck for bones, rinds.
How to write, after that, about the infinite?
A bricklayer falls from a roof, dies and no longer eats lunch.
To innovate, then, the trope, the metaphor?
A merchant cheats a customer out of a gram.
To speak, after that, about the fourth dimension?
A banker falsifies his balance sheet.
With what face to cry in the theater?
An outcast sleeps with his foot behind his back.
To speak, after that, to anyone about Picasso?
Someone goes to a burial sobbing.
How then become a member of the Academy?
Someone cleans a rifle in his kitchen.
How dare one speak about the beyond?
Someone passes by counting with his fingers.
How speak of the not-i without screaming?
[Un hombre pasa con un pan al hombro]
Un hombre pasa con un pan al hombro
¿Voy a escribir, después, sobre mi double?
Otro se sienta, ráscase, extrae un piojo de su axila, mátalo
¿Con qué valor hablar del psicoanálisis?
Otro ha entrado a mi pecho con un palo en la mano
¿Hablar luego de Sócrates al médico?
Un cojo pasa dando el brazo a un niño
¿Voy, después, a leer a André Breton?
Otro tiembla de frío, tose, escupe sangre
¿Cabrá aludir jamás al Yo profundo?
Otro busca en el fango huesos, cáscaras
¿Cómo escribir, después, del infinite?
Un albañil cae de un techo, muere y ya no almuerza
¿Innovar, luego, el tropo, la metáfora?
Un comerciante roba un gramo en el peso a un client
¿Hablar, después, de cuarta dimensión?
Un banquero falsea su balance
¿Con qué cara llorar en el teatro?
Un paria duerme con el pie a la espalda
¿Hablar, después, a nadie de Picasso?
Alguien va en un entierro sollozando
¿Cómo luego ingresar a la Academia?
Alguien limpia un fusil en su cocina
¿Con qué valor hablar del más allá?
Alguien pasa contando con sus dedos
¿Cómo hablar del no-yó sin dar un grito?
5 Nov. 1937
By Cesar Vallejo 1892-1938 – (Spanish; trans. Clayton Eshleman)
The ones who look away will never see while we feel the suffering everyday. I am afraid it will never change though it should.
Your writing and posts deserve our full attention and contemplation. Thank you very much, Bridget.
It’s terrifying and beyond sad.
I have the same feelings as you about our comparative plenty when I see the news. That poem makes the points so well
So many of us ‘get it’ so many never will.
In this country there is a lot of suffering brought about as a result of poverty – one cannot get away from it, despite the myriad good works done by individuals, charities and businesses for the government appears to draw a blind eye to the plight of those really in need.
Africa, Asia, Europe, North and South America. Poverty is everywhere and in plain sight. We just choose not to see it or we force it out of sight.
I can barely speak right now as I contemplate your post. You are so right.
We seem destined to continue the nonsense and horrors that are inflicted on so many. Many humans do not understand what it is to be humane!
I just watched a video of Navalny’s mother saying goodbye to her son. No mother should have to do that.
When I was a teenager I used to wonder how previous generations let wars and holocausts happen. Now we have up to the minute evidence and we still let it happen.
Like you, I can not comprehend the lunacy that is this world. Everybody wants to fight for survival, fight for their rights, fight for promotions, fight for God knows what. Nobody can simply live and let live, they need to dominate, while the call the rest of us Woke or Pu—-s. I am so tired of political parties and organized religion that forget what their Mission Statements are supposed to be. Agents of Chaos and their enablers are all around us. Thanks for this post. Allan