Translation:The Black Heralds (1918)/The One of a Thousand

by César Vallejo

The lottery-ticket-vendor who shouts “The One of a Thousand”
shares some kind of essence with God.

All the lips pass by. Weariness
in a single wrinkle reveals its not-yet.
He passes by, this vendor who hoards,
perhaps nominal, like God,
along with tantalic bread, human
impotence of love.

I watch the rag-dressed man. And he could
gives us the heart;
but that luck that he doles out
in his hands, proclaiming loudly,
like a cruel bird, will come to a stop
where he neither knows nor wants,
this Bohemian god.

And I say on this warm Friday
overwhelmed by the sun:
why would God’s will have clothed itself
as a lottery-ticket-vendor!