Over the sea came the pirate
messenger of the Devil, with his
steady fixed stare and his
monotonous wooden leg.
We must learn to remember what the
clouds cannot forget.
Over the seas,
with the hyacinth and the bull, with
flour and iron came the Negro, to
make gold:
and to weep in his exile, over the
seas came the Negro.
Now can we forget
what the clouds can still remember
Over the seas,
the parchments of the law,
the rod for fraudulent measuring,
and the pox of the viceroys,
and death, to sleep
without waking,
over the seas.
A hard thing to remember what the
clouds cannot forget over the seas.
(Translated from the Spanish by G. R. Coulthard)
