Áporo Trans.

Rosemary Arrojo Áporo

Carlos Drummond de Andrade
Um inseto cava
cava sem alarme
perfurando a terra
sem achar escape.
Que fazer, exausto,
em país bloqueado,
enlace de noite
raiz e minério?
Eis que o labirinto
(oh razão, mistério)
presto se desata:
em verde, sozinha,
antieuclidiana,
uma orquídea forma-se.
Carlos Drummond de Andrade In: A
Rosa do Povo (1945).
An insect digs
digs without alarm
Trans. Unknown
An insect digs
boring the earth digs in silence
without finding an escape. The insect bores
piercing the ground
finding no escape bores with firm resolve
What can one do, exhausted, piercing the ground
in a blockaded country, to find no way out.
What can one do, exhausted,
union of night in a confining site,
root and mineral? What to do, burnt out,
union of night
root and mineral? in this sealed-off country,
And then the labyrinth this entangled nighttime
(oh reason, mystery) roots and iron rocks?
But look: the labyrinth
quickly unties itself: (oh reason, mistery)
And lo, that maze
is suddenly untied:
in green, alone, (oh, reason and riddle)
an-Euclidean, quickly unravels:
in green, alone
an orchid forms. anti-Euclidean,
in green, alone,
an orchid is forming.
non-Euclidian,
the orchid unfolds.

Aporo1
1
ÁPORO Áporo: 1 – a difficult problem; 3 – a plant of the orchid family,
2 – a highly specialized wasp that bores herbaceous, solitary, generally greenish.
Trans. John Nist and pierces the ground to hide its prey;