Centre for Romanian Studies

Poetry in Translation (CLXXXIII: Jorge Luis BORGES (1899 – 1986), Argentina, Poet: “Noi suntem Epoca, Noi suntem Legenda”, “We are the time. We are the famous”

Jorge Luis BORGES
(1899 – 1986)

We are the time. We are the famous
by Jorge Luis Borges

We are the time. We are the famous
metaphor from Heraclitus the Obscure.

We are the water, not the hard diamond,
the one that is lost, not the one that stands still.

We are the river and we are that greek
that looks himself into the river. His reflection
changes into the waters of the changing mirror,
into the crystal that changes like the fire.

We are the vain predetermined river,
in his travel to his sea.

The shadows have surrounded him.
Everything said goodbye to us, everything goes away.

Memory does not stamp his own coin.

However, there is something that stays
however, there is something that bemoans.

Noi suntem Epoca, Noi suntem Legenda
Jorge Luis Borges
(1899 – 1986)

Noi suntem Epoca. Noi suntem Legendara
Metaforă a lui Heraclit cel Obscur.

Noi suntem unda, nu piatra nestemată,
Cea trecătoare, nu cea de sine-stătătoare.

Noi suntem apa şi chipul antic
Al profilului grec, ce se reflectă în undă. Faţa
Lui se transformă în apele oglinzii schimbătoare
A pietrei nestemate sclipind ca flacăra.

Noi suntem fluviul inutil, preprogramat,
În drumul lui spre ocean.

Umbrele l-au cernit.
Totul şi-a luat rămas bun dela noi, totul se îndepărtează.

Memoria nu- şi pune stigmatul pe propria-i pecete.

Şi totuşi, este ceva ce rămâne
Şi totuşi, este ceva ce mâhneşte.

(Rendered in Romanian by Constantin ROMAN
© 2013 Copyright Constantin ROMAN)

* * * * * * * *

SON LOS RÍOS
Jorge Luis BORGES (1899 – 1986)

Somos el tiempo. Somos la famosa
parábola de Heráclito el Oscuro.
Somos el agua, no el diamante duro,
la que se pierde, no la que reposa.

Somos el río y somos aquel griego
que se mira en el río. Su reflejo
cambia en el agua del cambiante espejo,
en el cristal que cambia como el fuego.

Somos el vano río prefijado,
rumbo a su mar. La sombra lo ha cercado.
Todo nos dijo adiós, todo se aleja.

La memoria no acuña su moneda.
Y sin embargo hay algo que se queda

* * * * * * * * * * *
Nota Bene: the Editor is grateful to Sr el Don Ray Escámez Rivero, Madrid, for graciously providing the above verse in Spanish
y sin embargo hay algo que se queja.

SHORT BIO NOTE:
Jorge Luis Borges
I lived from 1899-1986. I was from Argentina, and am in the Americas category.
Argentine poet, essayist, and short-story writer whose tales of fantasy and dreamworlds are classics of the 20th-century world literature. Borges was profoundly influenced by European culture, English literature, and such thinkers as Berkeley, who argued that there is no material substance; the sensible world consists only of ideas, which exists for so long as they are perceived. Most of Borges’s tales embrace universal themes – the often recurring circular labyrinth can be seen as a metaphor of life or a riddle which theme is time. Although his name was mentioned in speculations about Nobel Prize, Borges never became a Nobel Laureate.