On my way out of the country I picked up a copy of Ruben Dario’s poems in the Managua airport, hoping his modernist/romantic style would help me through the sense~making of travel in such a beguiling country. Having been in love with several of Dario’s other pieces, it was ¡Eheu! (El Canto Errante) that I felt flow through me as the plane departed and headed for the States, leaving behind many amazing people and experiences. I just wanted to share, hoping that you might like it.

¡Eheu! (El Canto Errante)

~ Rúben Dario 

Here, beside the Latin sea,

I speak the truth:

I sense my antiquity

in the rocks, the oil, the wine.

How ancient I am, dear God,

how ancient I am!

Where has my song come from?

And where am I going?

The cost of knowing my own self

is the long moments of profound despair

and the how and the when–

And this Latin clarity,

what use is it here

at the entrance to the mine

of the me and the not-me?

I am a student of the clouds,

I think I can interpret

the confidences of the wind,

the earth and the sea–

A few vague confidences

about being and non-being,

and fragments of awareness

from today and yesterday.

I stopped and cried out,

as if in the midst of a desert,

and I thought the sun was dead,

and burst into tears.