Translated by A. Z. Foreman - Self-Portrait lyrics

My childhood is all memories of a patio in Seville, A orchard in the light where lemons ripened every fall, My life as a young man- some twenty years about Castille, My adult life- a few things I would rather not recall. I've never gone Lothario or played at Don Juan at parties. It's obvious from my slovenly apparel that I can't. Still, I endured the arrow meted out to me by Cupid And loved as much as women's hospitality could grant. Though drops of leftist rebel blood may pulse throughout my body, My verse has welled forth from a peaceful spring through all my days More so than the good boys who follow all the holy strictures, I stand as a good man, and in the good sense of the phrase. I give myself to beauty. In contemporary fashion I've cut some cla**ic roses from the garden of Ronsard But I've no love for make-up of the Modernist beauticians And do not flock with birds that sing in high-flown avant-garde. And I dislike the balladry of hollow lovelorn tenors, The cricket-choirs and tweety-birds who warble at the moon. I co*k my ear to try and tell the voices from the echos, And of the many voices I but listen to the one. Cla**ical or Romantic - which am I? Who knows. I rather Would leave my poetry just as a warrior leaves his blade, More famous for the manful hand that brandished it to purpose Than prized for the learn'd crafting of the forger at his trade. I am in conversation with a friend who's always with me. - Who talks alone can hope someday to talk with the Divine - All my soliloquy amounts to talk with this companion Who shared with me the secret key to loving humankind And in the end, I owe you nothing. You owe me for writing. I go about my work with care, and what I earn I keep To buy the suit that keeps me clothed, the roof that keeps me sheltered, The bread that keeps the life in me, the bed on which I sleep. And when at last my day arrives, the day of final journey Whose ship of no return is set to raise the anchor free, You'll find me happily aboard, a lightfoot with scant luggage And scarcely clad beneath the sun, like the children of the sea.