Read at Carmelite Conversations, 1st of December 2021
[En
una noche oscura]
Once in the dark of night,
my longings caught and raging in love’s ray
(O windfall of delight!)
I slipped unseen away
as all my home in a deep slumber lay.
Secure, in more than night,
close hid and up the stair a secret way
(O windfall of delight!)
in the night, in feigned array
as all my home in a deep slumber lay.
There in the lucky dark,
stealing in secrecy, by none espied;
nothing for eyes to mark,
no other light, no guide
but in my heart: that fire would not subside.
That led me on –
that dazzle truer than high noon is true
to where there waited one
I knew – how well I knew! –
in a place where no one was in view.
O dark of night, my guide!
O sweeter than anything sunrise can discover!
O night, drawing side to side
the loved and lover,
the loved one wholly ensouling in the lover.
There in my festive breast
walled for his pleasure-garden, his alone,
the lover remained at rest
and I gave all I own,
gave all, in air from the cedars softly blown.
All, in wind from the wall
as my hand in his hair moved lovingly at play.
He let soft fingers fall
and I swooned dead away
wounded: all senses in oblivion lay.
Quite out of self suspended –
my forehead on the lover’s own reclined.
And that way the world ended
with all my cares untwined
among the lilies falling and out of mind.
Translated by John Frederick Nims (1959)
[Oh llama de amor viva]
O living flame of love
that so tenderly wounds
my soul at its deepest centre:
you are no longer fickle,
so finish, if you will –
rend the cloth, end this sweet encounter.
O gentle searing brand
and caressing wound,
O soothing touch from his soft hand
that feels like life eternal
and pays off every debt:
you killed me, making life from death.
O you lanterns of fire,
your brilliance inflames
the deep caverns of my senses
that were blackened and blind.
With rare elegance
You shed warmth and light on your beloved!
How gentle and loving
your reminder to me,
in my heart where you secretly dwell
with your delightful breath
in glory and good will,
how soothingly do you woo me!
Translated by Ken Krabbenhoft (1999)
[Que bien se yo la fonte]
As if the prisms of the kaleidoscope
I plunged once in a butt of muddied water
surfaced like a marvellous lightship
and out of its silted crystals a monk’s face
that had spoken years ago from behind a grille
spoke again about the need and chance
to salvage everything, to re-envisage
the zenith and glimpsed jewels of any gift
mistakenly abased …
What came to nothing could always be replenished.
‘Read poems as prayers,’ he said, ‘and for your penance
translate me something by Juan de la Cruz.’
Returned from Spain to our chapped wilderness,
his consonants aspirate, his forehead shining,
he had made me feel there was nothing to confess.
Now his sandalled passage stirred me on to this:
How well I know that fountain, filling, running,
although it is the night.
That eternal fountain, hidden away,
I know its haven and its secrecy
although it is the night.
But not its source because it does not have one,
which is all sources’ source and origin
Although it is the night.
No other thing can be so beautiful.
Here the earth and heaven drink their fill
although it is the night.
So pellucid it never can be muddied,
and I know that all light radiates from it
although it is the night.
I know no sounding-line can find its bottom,
nobody ford or plumb its deepest fathom
although it is the night.
And its current so in flood it overspills
to water hell and heaven and all peoples
although it is the night.
And the current that is generated there,
as far as it wills to, it can flow that far
although it is the night.
And from these two a third current proceeds
which neither of these two, I know, precedes
Although it is the night.
This eternal fountain hides and splashes
within this living bread that is life to us
although it is the night.
Hear it calling out to every creature.
And they drink these waters, although it is dark here
Because it is the night.
I am repining for this living fountain.
Within this bread of life I see it plain
although it is the night.
Translated
by the Irish Nobel Prize poet Seamus Heaney (1984)
John of the Cross
A sonnet by Malcolm Guite
Deep in the dark your brothers locked you up
But not so deep as your dear Love could dive,
There at the end of colour, sense and shape,
The dark dead end that tells us we’re alive,
You sang aloud and found your absent lover,
As light’s true end comes with the end of light.
In the rich midnight came the lovely other,
You saw him plain although it was the night.
And now you call us all to hear that Fountain
Singing and playing well before the Dawn
The sun is still below this shadowed mountain
We wait in darkness for him to be born.
Before he rises, light-winged with the lark,
We’ll meet with our beloved in the dark.
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