Canzonetta Poem by León de Greiff

It rains outside the windows (verlainesque
Rain, if not in in my heart:
My heart ran somewhere else one day in search
Of other songs to start)

It rains outside the windows (melancholic
Rain which in certain ways is quite poetic
-But nonetheless prosaic, or symbolic...)
It rains and rains no more....Rain is splenetic.

I never figured how to watch such rain
Tracing the pane - tranced in philosophy-
More often than not it fell upon my (blonde
till they left) locks...- a trance of atrophy-

It rains outside the windows. I smoke. I write.
The windows wall me off from the urbane
Traffickings....And I'm a lascivious
Bird clamped inside my cage. Always in vain.

It rains outside the windows (verlainesque
Rain, if not in in my heart)
My heart ran off- capricious thing!-
After some silly song to sing
Not rhyming and not reasoning,
With neither whole nor part.



Translated by A.Z. Foreman