NOEL DUFFY [8402]

Noel Duffy nació en Dublín en 1971 y estudió Física Experimental en el Trinity College de Dublín. Después de un breve período en la investigación, se dedicó a la escritura y pasó a co-editar (con Theo Dorgan) la antología Watching the River Flow: Un siglo de Poesía en Irlanda (Poetry Ireland, 1999). Fue el ganador en 2003 del Premio de Poesía Chapbook START por su poemario, The Silence After y más recientemente el Premio de Poesía Firewords. Su obra de teatro, The Rainstorm, fue producida para el Festival Fringe de Dublín en 2006. Su trabajo ha aparecido ampliamente en Irlanda (incluida Poetry Ireland Review, Film Ireland and The Dublin Review), así como en el Reino Unido, EE.UU., Bélgica y Sudáfrica.

WEB:   http://noelduffy.net/

Las Lunas

Todo el día él ha esperado  que oscureciera

al tiempo que los carruajes traqueteaban por el patio

debajo de su ventana el grito de los puesteros

en el mercado llenando el aire hasta el atardecer.

Ahora todo se ha aquietado en las  calles  angostas

Orion trepa desde el sur y la campana de la catedral

entona la solemne nota del Angelus sobre Padua.

Él  se calienta las  manos con los extinguidos rescoldos de su fuego,

luego enfoca el telescopio por sobre los techos

de las casas de los mercaderes en la plaza,

bien alto por encima de su mundo de comercio e intercambio,

sus libros de balances  y contadas horas.

Y como, al mirar más de cerca, el cielo estalla

en el ojo de su explorador, la noche más derrochadora

de lo que  podría haberse imaginado,

las Siete Hermanas, titilando y familiares

elevándose por sobre el horizonte y Júpiter, el punto más brillante,

en lo alto de toda la oscuridad,  nada  hasta hacerse nítido

con las cuatro lunas fijas en su órbita,

 presencias fantasmagóricas alrededor del

clima cambiante de otro planeta. Esas extrañas estaciones

que ha presenciado en los cielos pero ninguna como esta

gigante tormenta arremolinándose  en la distancia, su iris de sangre

que lo busca a través de los espacios vacíos

como si fuera el ojo de Dios que lo ha encontrado

enmarcado  en la ventana, su vista débil

 única prueba contra toda  la ignorancia y la duda

de que a veces un corazón puede perder un latido

y  después, nada será lo mismo.

Traducción:  Marina Kohon

The Moons

All day he has waited for the light to fade

as carts and carriages rattled by in the courtyard

below his window, the shouts of traders

in the marketplace filling the air till dusk.

Now all has grown quiet in the narrow streets

as Orion climbs from the south and the cathedral bell                                                                                         

intones the solemn note of the Angelus over Padua.

He warms his hands by the dying embers of his fire,

then aims his telescope above the rooftops

of the merchants’ houses on the square,

high above their world of commerce and trade,

their balanced ledgers and numbered hours.

And how, on looking closer, the sky explodes

in the viewfinder, the night more profligate

than he could’ve ever imagined it,

the Seven Sisters, shimmering and familiar,

rising above the horizon and Jupiter, brightest point 

in all the darkness overhead, swims into focus

its four moons fixed in their circuits,

circling like ghostly presences across the shifting

weather of another planet. Such strange seasons

he has witnessed in the heavens but none like this

giant storm churning in the distance, its blooded iris

searching him out across the empty spaces

as though it were the eye of God that had found him

framed in this window, his failing sight

his only proof against all ignorance and doubt

that sometimes the heart can miss a beat

and is never quite the same after.  

A Stone

An inert mass in the palm,

egg-like, smoothed by weather,

too cold to be living or dying.

The furious energies of matter

are arrested here, made still for a moment

like a breath held under water.

In the grain and speckles of its surface

is a chronicle in miniature

of sky and earth, a prehistory

of spirit; then letting go, the invisible

magic of release and fall,

gravity’s angel in the undergrowth.

The Rings

Washing my face my eye catches

the silver of the ring on my left hand.

My surprise, every time!

My face stares back at me from the mirror,

your naked body pale in the shadows

as you bend to recover your dress

from the floor. I turn.

There are such moments when we could

almost believe . . . such moments.

*

How last night in the hotel lobby the power

failed again and we gathered around the gaslight

with the others, Mohammed playing drums

and telling jokes I had already heard in Dublin,

the Americans and their stories of the desert.

How you said so little, while I, tempted at every turn,

elaborated on the details of our life together -

you, silent and unhappy in the shadows.

How one smile would’ve been enough.

*

That day in Dublin before we left,

the rain bucketed down on us.

We walked out among the city streets oblivious

in a trance of expectation.

Then stopping at a stall on College Green

bought two matching silver rings -

cover for our travelling together

in Islamic North Africa, our faked marriage

and imaginary honeymoon in better

weather. We laughed at the silliness of it,

but pressed the rings deep into our pockets

and thought of nothing else all evening.

*

Today I find your ring on the dresser.

Last night before you went to sleep

I noticed how, tired of unnecessary

fictions, you placed it there,

and I knew that you would not wear it again.