Litttle Gidding (2)
III
Hay tres condiciones que a menudo se parecen
aunque son totalmente diferentes, crecen en el mismo seto:
apego a uno mismo y a las cosas y a las personas, desapego
de uno mismo y de las cosas y de las personas; y creciendo entre ellos,
la indiferencia
que se parece a los otros como la muerte se parece a la vida,
estar entre dos vidas –sin florecer, entre
la ortiga viva y la muerta. Este es el uso de la memoria:
para la liberación –no menos amor sino expansión
del amor más allá del deseo, y así liberación
del futuro y también del pasado. Así, el amor a un país
comienza como el apego a nuestro propio campo de acción
y descubre que esa acción de poco importancia
aunque jamás indistinta. La historia puede ser servidumbre,
la historia puede ser libertad. Mira, ahora se desvanecen,
los rostros y los lugares, con el ser que, como pudo, los amó,
para renovarse, transformarse en otra cosa.
El pecado es Necesario, pero
todo estará bien, y
la forma de las cosas estará bien.
Si pienso, otra vez, en este lugar,
y en la gente, no del todo encomiable,
sin parentesco cercano o bondad,
pero de un genio peculiar,
todos tocados por un genio común,
unidos en el conflicto que los dividió:
si pienso en un rey al anochecer,
en tres hombres y aun más, en el cadalso
y en unos pocos que murieron olvidados
en otros sitios, aquí en el extranjero,
y en uno que murió ciego y tranquilo,
¿Por qué deberíamos honrar
a estos muertos más que a los moribundos?
No es llamar al pasado
ni es un conjuro
para llamar al espectro de la Rosa.
No podemos resucitar viejas facciones
no podemos restaurar viejas políticas
o seguir un antiguo tambor.
Estos hombres y aquellos que se les opusieron
aceptan la constitución del silencio
y forman un solo grupo.
Todo lo que heredamos de los afortunados
lo tomamos de los derrotados
de lo que tenían para dejarnos –un símbolo:
un símbolo perfeccionado en la muerte.
Y todo estará bien y
la forma de las cosas estará bien
por la purificación de la causa
en el campo de nuestra súplica.
T. S. Eliot, St. Louis, 1888- Kensington, 1965
De The Four
Quartets, Faber and Faber, Londres,
1944
Versión © Silvia Camerotto
III
There are
three conditions which often look alike
Yet differ completely, flourish in the same hedgerow:
Attachment to self and to things and to persons, detachment
From self and from things and from persons; and, growing between them, indifference
Which resembles the others as death resembles life,
Being between two lives - unflowering, between
The live and the dead nettle. This is the use of memory:
For liberation - not less of love but expanding
Of love beyond desire, and so liberation
From the future as well as the past. Thus, love of a country
Begins as an attachment to our own field of action
And comes to find that action of little importance
Though never indifferent. History may be servitude,
History may be freedom. See, now they vanish,
The faces and places, with the self which, as it could, loved them,
To become renewed, transfigured, in another pattern.
Sin is Behovely, but
All shall be well, and
All manner of thing shall be well.
If I think, again, of this place,
And of people, not wholly commendable,
Of not immediate kin or kindness,
But of some peculiar genius,
All touched by a common genius,
United in the strife which divided them;
If I think of a king at nightfall,
Of three men, and more, on the scaffold
And a few who died forgotten
In other places, here and abroad,
And of one who died blind and quiet,
Why should we celebrate
These dead men more than the dying?
It is not to ring the bell backward
Nor is it an incantation
To summon the spectre of a Rose.
We cannot revive old factions
We cannot restore old policies
Or follow an antique drum.
These men, and those who opposed them
And those whom they opposed
Accept the constitution of silence
And are folded in a single party.
Whatever we inherit from the fortunate
We have taken from the defeated
What they had to leave us - a symbol:
A symbol perfected in death.
And all shall be well and
All manner of thing shall be well
By the purification of the motive
In the ground of our beseeching.
Yet differ completely, flourish in the same hedgerow:
Attachment to self and to things and to persons, detachment
From self and from things and from persons; and, growing between them, indifference
Which resembles the others as death resembles life,
Being between two lives - unflowering, between
The live and the dead nettle. This is the use of memory:
For liberation - not less of love but expanding
Of love beyond desire, and so liberation
From the future as well as the past. Thus, love of a country
Begins as an attachment to our own field of action
And comes to find that action of little importance
Though never indifferent. History may be servitude,
History may be freedom. See, now they vanish,
The faces and places, with the self which, as it could, loved them,
To become renewed, transfigured, in another pattern.
Sin is Behovely, but
All shall be well, and
All manner of thing shall be well.
If I think, again, of this place,
And of people, not wholly commendable,
Of not immediate kin or kindness,
But of some peculiar genius,
All touched by a common genius,
United in the strife which divided them;
If I think of a king at nightfall,
Of three men, and more, on the scaffold
And a few who died forgotten
In other places, here and abroad,
And of one who died blind and quiet,
Why should we celebrate
These dead men more than the dying?
It is not to ring the bell backward
Nor is it an incantation
To summon the spectre of a Rose.
We cannot revive old factions
We cannot restore old policies
Or follow an antique drum.
These men, and those who opposed them
And those whom they opposed
Accept the constitution of silence
And are folded in a single party.
Whatever we inherit from the fortunate
We have taken from the defeated
What they had to leave us - a symbol:
A symbol perfected in death.
And all shall be well and
All manner of thing shall be well
By the purification of the motive
In the ground of our beseeching.