Spanish Version
PRECIOSA Y EL AIRE
A Dámaso Alonso
1. Su luna de pergamino
2. Preciosa tocando viene,
3. por un anfibio sendero
4. de cristales y laureles.
5. El silencio sin estrellas,
6. huyendo del sonsonete,
7. cae donde el mar bate y canta
8. su noche llena de peces.
9. En los picos de la sierra
10. los carabineros duermen
11. guardando las blancas torres
12. donde viven los ingleses.
13. Y los gitanos del agua
14. levantan por distraerse,
15. glorietas de caracolas
16. y ramas de pino verde.
17. Su luna de pergamino
18. Preciosa tocando viene.
19. Al verla se ha levantado
20. el viento que nunca duerme.
21. San Cristobalón desnudo,
22. lleno de lenguas celestes,
23. mira la niña tocando
24. una dulce gaita ausente.
25. Niña, deja que levante
26. tu vestido para verte.
27. Abre en mis dedos antiguos
28. la rosa azul de tu vientre.
29. Preciosa tira el pandero
30. y corre sin detenerse.
31. El viento-hombrón la persigue
32. con una espada caliente.
33. Frunce su rumor el mar.
34. Los olivos palidecen.
35. Cantan las flautas de umbría
36. y el liso gong de la nieve.
37. ¡Preciosa, corre, Preciosa,
38. que te coge el viento verde!
39. ¡Preciosa, corre, Preciosa!
40. ¡Míralo por dónde viene!
41. Sátiro de estrellas bajas
42. con sus lenguas relucientes.
43. Preciosa, llena de miedo,
44. entra en la casa que tiene,
45. más arriba de los pinos,
46. el cónsul de los ingleses.
47. Asustados por los gritos
48. tres carabineros vienen,
49. sus negras capas ceñidas
50. y los gorros en las sienes.
51. El inglés da a la gitana
52. un vaso de tibia leche,
53. y una copa de ginebra
54. que Preciosa no se bebe.
55. Y mientras cuenta, llorando,
56. su aventura a aquella gente,
57. en las tejas de pizarra
58. el viento, furioso, muerde.
English Version
The Gypsy and the Wind
Playing her parchment moon
Precosia comes
along a watery path of laurels and crystal lights.
The starless silence, fleeing
from her rhythmic tambourine,
falls where the sea whips and sings,
his night filled with silvery swarms.
High atop the mountain peaks
the sentinels are weeping;
they guard the tall white towers
of the English consulate.
And gypsies of the water
for their pleasure erect
little castles of conch shells
and arbors of greening pine.
Playing her parchment moon
Precosia comes.
The wind sees her and rises,
the wind that never slumbers.
Naked Saint Christopher swells,
watching the girl as he plays
with tongues of celestial bells
on an invisible bagpipe.
Gypsy, let me lift your skirt
and have a look at you.
Open in my ancient fingers
the blue rose of your womb.
Precosia throws the tambourine
and runs away in terror.
But the virile wind pursues her
with his breathing and burning sword.
The sea darkens and roars,
while the olive trees turn pale.
The flutes of darkness sound,
and a muted gong of the snow.
Precosia, run, Precosia!
Or the green wind will catch you!
Precosia, run, Precosia!
And look how fast he comes!
A satyr of low-born stars
with their long and glistening tongues.
Precosia, filled with fear,
now makes her way to that house
beyond the tall green pines
where the English consul lives.
Alarmed by the anguished cries,
three riflemen come running,
their black capes tightly drawn,
and berets down over their brow.
The Englishman gives the gypsy
a glass of tepid milk
and a shot of Holland gin
which Precosia does not drink.
And while she tells them, weeping,
of her strange adventure,
the wind furiously gnashes
against the slate roof tiles.
Lorca’s reputation as a great poet seems to have been caused by his execution without a trial after being arrested by nationalists in the Spanish Civil War who supported General Francisco Franco. At such an early age he had gone through many troubles such as his homosexuality that he kept hidden from the public eye and thus had to keep up the act of being a dominant, charming and magnetic person. His friendship with Salvador Dali went sour after many years of knowing each other and collaborating in artistic work since entering the famous Residencia de Estudiantes in 1921. Apparently Lorca was offended after Dali and Bunuel made the film An Andalusia Dog insulting Lorca because he was from Andalusia.
As a 20th century poet, Lorca’s method of poetry combines surprising metaphors with endless amounts of personifications and allusive imagery. The Gypsy Ballads composed in the 1920’s are a clear example of Lorca coming to terms with a surrealist style out of a traditional. I believe that the chosen dilemmas in the gypsy settings relate to Lorca’s own sexual anxieties and that they ultimately make a statement of his personal feelings. Although the translated version of the Gypsy and the Wind are free verse the Spanish version keeps a complex rhythm. This rhyme appears at the end of a line known as end rhymes. The poem contains the examples of vowel rhymes which rhyme words have only their vowel sound in common. So the end rhymes are vowel rhymes in every other line, such as in line 1 and 3, 18 and 20, 21 and 23 and so on—pergamino / sendero; viene / duerme; desnudo / tocando.
The word “gypsy” brings to mind the connotations or associations it has had with other writers such as Cervantes, Gabriel Garcia Marquez, and Georges Bizet’s opera “Carmen”, all of which I have read or seen in theater. All of which see the gypsy with freedom, thievery, and excitement but never alone or afraid. Lorca has taken this connotation and changed it dramatically by writing about the gypsy being chased by the wind trying to rape her and ending up with the English Consul where they give her alcohol to calm her down which tells the reader she is still under harm. Lorca is able to make a vivid description of a surrealist world and creates over the top emotions. Everything natural is personified in Lorca’s world as he describes the virile wind in pursuit as the sea roars while the olive trees turn pale. He gives the wind feet to run with, the sea a voice to roar with, and the olive trees emotion to turn pale.
This poem engaged me to make art about the set design because of the wild imagery and the two-sided world’s of calm and unrest. We begin the poem peacefully and fall just like the gypsy girl into a rapid chase and end relaxed with a glass of milk. The overall mood is trouble just like the connotation of the word “gypsy”, and just like Lorca’s own life. This poem has become an artistic motivation and inspiration for me because the use of words to become more than they are is fascinating to see and could become a play, a novel or a song. The words conjure up emotions fast enough to fill us with fear and uncertainty of what is to come and this is what Lorca evidently left us with as he ends his adventurous poem with the wind furiously gnashing the roof tiles.
