Translation:The Black Heralds (1918)/Village Woman

by César Vallejo

 
Distant vibration of gloomy cowbells
overflows in the air
the rural fragrance of its worries.
In the silent patio
the setting sun bleeds its farewell
The autumnal amber of the panorama
takes on a cold tint of aching gray.

At the gate of the house
which time has clawed full of holes
the calm silhouette
of a gold-colored ox,
appears silent
and later passes to the nearby stable,
yearning with his biblical puils,
hearing the oration of the cowbells,
for his virile years as a bull.

At the wall of the garden,
giving flight to the grief of his song,
springs the gentle rooster, and, in alert sadness,
like two teardrops,
his eyes tremble in the dead evening.

It languidly tears itself up
in the ancient village,
the sweet yaravi of a guitar,
in whose eternity of deep loss
the sad voice of an Indian don-dons
like the old bell of a churchyard.

Resting my elbows over the wall,
when the dark shade triumphs in the soul
and the wind in the stiff tree branches prays
cries of quenas, timid, uncertain,
I sigh in worry,
in seeing the golden and red penumbra
weeping a tragic blue of dead idylls.