Translation:My First Verses
I was fourteen and I studied humanities.
One day I felt a rabid desire to create verses, and to mail them to a very beautiful girl who had rejected me.
I locked myself in my room, and there in solitude, after unprecedented efforts, I condensed as much as I could, into a few stanzas, all of the bitterness in my heart.
When I saw, on a small sheet of paper, those lovely little short lines, when I read them aloud and considered that my wit had produced them, a delicious sensation of vanity and pride seized me.
Immediately I thought of publishing them in La Calavera, the only newspaper that there was at the time, and so I sent them to the editor undercover and without a signature.
My goal was to savor the many compliments that I would undoubtedly receive, and to then reveal modestly who the author was when my own love would be satisfied.
That was my salvation.
A few days later, the 5th issue of La Calavera was printed, and my verses did not appear in its columns.
They would surely publish them in the 6th issue, I said to myself, so I resigned myself to waiting, for there was no other remedy.
But not in the 6th, nor in the 7th, nor in the 8th, nor in the issues that followed did my verses appear.
I was almost driven to despair, but my first poem would come out in print; the 13th issue of La Calavera finally fulfilled my desires.
Those who do not believe in God believe firmly in any barbarity, for example, that the number 13 is unlucky, a precursor of disgrace and a messenger of death.
La Calavera had hardly reached my hands, but I dressed to the nines and ran into the street with the object that would bring praise, carrying with me the famous number 13.
After only a few steps, I encountered a friend, with whom I initiated the following dialogue:
"What's up, Pepe?"
"Nothing. You?"
"I'm doing perfectly. Tell me, have you seen the 13th issue of La Calavera?"
"I don't believe in that newspaper."
A jar of cold water on the back or a good step on a callus would not have produced such an unpleasant impression as that which I experienced upon hearing those six words.
My wishful thinking diminished by 50%, because I had figured that everyone would be obligated to read at least the 13th issue.
"Well, then," I replied somewhat annoyed, "I have here the latest issue and I want you to give me your opinion about these verses which seem to me to be quite good."
My friend Pepe read the verses and the vile boy dared to tell me that they couldn't be worse.
I had an impulse to punch the insolent child that could not recognize the true merit of my work; but I contained myself and swallowed the pill, so to speak.
The same such thing happened to me with all of those whom I interrogated about the same matter, and there was no better solution than to confess flat out... that all of them were idiots.
Tired of trying my fortune in the street, I went to a house where I found about ten to twelve visitors. After saying hello, I, for the thousandth time, asked:
"Have you all seen the 13th issue of La Calavera?"
"No, I haven't seen it," answered one of them. "What does it have?"
"It has, amongst other things, some verses that, from what they say, are not that bad."
"Would you be so kind as to let us read them?"
"With pleasure."
I withdrew La Calavera from my pocket, I unfolded it slowly, and full of emotion, but with all the fire of my enthusiasm, I read the stanzas.
Immediately, I asked:
"What do you all think about the merit of this literary piece?
They did not hesitate to answer, and the conversation followed this way:
"I don't like those verses."
"They're not that good."
"They couldn't be worse."
"If they keep publishing such stupidities in La Calavera, I will ask that they erase me from their subscription list."
"The public should demand that they tar-and-feather the author."
"And the journalist."
"What atrocity!"
"What barbarity!"
"What stupidity!"
"What monstrosity!"
I left the house angered, and I categorized those uncivil people as stupid. "Stultorum plena sunt omnia,"[1] I said to console myself.
All of those who have not learned to appreciate the beauty of my verses, I thought, are ignorant people who have not studied humanities, and who, as a consequence, lack the knowledge necessary to judge as one should in the matter of fine literature.
The best thing to do would be to go to speak with the editor of La Calavera, the man of letters that published my verses.
Effectively, I reached the editing office of the newspaper, and I said to the boss:
"I've seen the 13th issue of La Calavera."
"Have you subscribed to my newspaper?"
"Yes, sir."
"Have you come to give me something for the next issue?"
"That's not what brought me. It's that I have seen some verses—"
"Those damned verses: the public is frying me with complaints. You are quite correct, young man, because they are bad—they're of the worst; but what do you want? The deadline was nearing, and I lacked half a column, so I threw in those condemned verses that a certain person sent to irritate me."
I heard those last words in the street, and I left without saying farewell, determined to end my days.
I would shoot myself, I thought, I'll hang myself, I'll drink venom. I'll jump from a bell tower to the street, I'll jump into the river with a rock around my neck, or I'll starve to death, because there is simply not enough humanly strength to resist such torture.
But to die so young... and, on top of that, nobody even knew that I was the author of the verses.
Finally, reader, I promise to you that I did not kill myself, but I became cured, for a long time, from the obsession of creating verses. With regard to the number 13 and to las calaveras[2], the next time that you are in a good mood, I will tell you something so terrible that it will send shivers down your spine.