i need the transaltion for this poem to english
thanks!


TE QUIERO
Tus manos son mi caricia
mis acordes cotidianos
te quiero porque tus manos
trabajan por la justicia

si te quiero es porque sos
mi amor mi cómplice y todo
y en la calle codo a codo
somos mucho más que dos

tus ojos son mi conjuro
contra la mala jornada
te quiero por tu mirada
que mira y siembra futuro

tu boca que es tuya y mía
tu boca no se equivoca
te quiero porque tu boca
sabe gritar rebeldía

si te quiero es porque sos
mi amor mi cómplice y todo
y en la calle codo a codo
somos mucho más que dos

y por tu rostro sincero
y tu paso vagabundo
y tu llanto por el mundo
porque sos pueblo te quiero

y porque amor no es aureola
ni cándida moraleja
y porque somos pareja
que sabe que no está sola

te quiero en mi paraíso
es decir que en mi país
la gente viva feliz
aunque no tenga permiso

si te quiero es porque sos
mi amor mi cómplice y todo
y en la calle codo a codo
somos mucho más que dos

This would be my hit at the first verse- using Babelfish for a rough translation. Line breaks are the same.

pam

I WANT TO YOU

Your daily agreed hands are my caress my I want to you because your hands work by justice

TE QUIERO

Tus manos son mi caricia
mis acordes cotidianos
te quiero porque tus manos
trabajan por la justicia

I love you/want you

Your hands caress me,,
fulfilling my daily need,
I love you/want you because your hands
work for justice.

pam

[tinyurl.com]

Click on one of the "Translate this page" links.

You can trigger the search from Google:

[www.google.com]

"codo a codo / somos mucho más que dos" means "elbow to elbow we are much more than two"

It looks good. I'll take it home and bring you something tomorrow morning.

This is LITERAL except where [bracketed]:


I LOVE YOU
by Mario Benedetti

Your hands are my caress[es],
my daily reminders
I love you because your hands
work for justice

If I love you, it's because you are
my love my accomplice and all
and in the street elbow to elbow [arm in arm]
we are much more than two

Your eyes are my spell [charm]
against [slipping into] the evil way/work
I love you for your look [gaze]
that looks [sees] and sows the future

Your mouth that is yours and mine
Your mouth that is not mistaken/does not equivocate
I love you because your mouth
knows how to shout defiance

If I love you it's because you are
my love my accomplice and all
and in the street elbow to elbow [arm in arm]
we are much more than two

And for your sincere face
and your vagabond step [wanderer's step]
and your cry [because you weep] for the world
because you are [the] people, I love you.

And because love is not a halo
or a simple moral [lesson of a story]
and because we are a pair
that knows it is not alone

I love you in my paradise
Which is to say [I mean] that in my [ideal] country
the people [shall] live happily
even without [getting] permission

If I love you it's because you are
my love my accomplice and all
and in the street elbow to elbow [arm in arm]
we are much more than two

=====================

About the word SOS ("te quiero porque sos"):

Spanish has two forms of YOU-YOUR-YOURS, one formal and one friendly. But note that in Spanish, as in Shakespeare's English, the formal one is used with one's superiors (boss, elders), but the FRIENDLY form (tu, tus, tuyo) is the one used in prayer. We think of "Thou" as a formality because it's unfamiliar, but it's really in FAMILIAR form.

So it would be CORRECT to translate this whole poem this way:

Thy hands are ...
I love thee because thou art...

But that would FEEL formal, and the poem uses the form of YOU that would be used between friends.

There are also two different Spanish verbs meaning TO BE.

ESTAR (esta, estas, eres) is for conditions:
estar en casa = to be at home
estar enamorada = to be in love
"Mi hijo eres tú" (thou art my son) in the Psalms

SER (es, es, sos) is for properties of things and of God
"Jehová ES Rey" (God is King) in Psalms
"no ES verdad" (it isn't true)
un SER humano = a human being

If you know any Spanish, you would expect verses 2, 5, and 9 to begin with "te quiero porque ERES. " That's what you'd here in any normal statement. So the use of "sos" is very noticable. I can think of three reasons for it, and I am not qualified to say which one(s) is/are right:

1. SOS to rhyme with DOS.

2. SOS to give a sense of worship, to use the PERMANENT form of "to be" as a subtle way of deifying the beloved.

3. Spanish usage varies A LOT from country to country and region to region. Maybe "sos" feels natural to someone from Benedetti's home (and I don't mean Italy).

Marian

He's from URAGUAY.

There's a well-organized website about him at
[patriagrande.net]


I glanced at a couple of poems and did NOT see the "sos" form used there, so MAYBE that means it's very deliberate in this poem (as opposed to just being the Uraguayan way).

Nice job, Marian!

My bet is that the 'sos' is there partly for the rhyming effect, and partly to emphasize the permanence of the feelings. I was taught that 'ser' is for permanent things, and 'estar' for things that change.

pam

Yeah, good job - beats the heck out of the Google!

Yeah, she even made it poetry- mine kept coming out all prose.

pam

Thanks, gang.

"SER is for permanent things, and ESTAR for things that change"

Yes, that's a good way to explain the difference ... but there's no perfect rule because of the eccentricities of the language.

Here are two bits from a single paragraph about a volcano in Costa Rica:

La montaña ESTÁ compuesta por basalto (The mountain is made of basalt)
BUT
El inmenso cráter ES de 1.3km de ancho (The huge crater is 1.3 kilometers wide)

You really can't explain the oddities of one language IN another language, n'est pas?

Thank goodness English doesn't have such quirks.

Good work Marian, and very interesting information. I don't know Spanish but from what's been said, maybe 'porque sos' could best be translated in verses 2, 5 and 9 as 'because you are ever'

IanB: Yes.

What I want to know is: What does Tania Paez think?

Guess I'm late to this party but in case anyone is still curious Agentina and Uruguay (and a few Central American countries) use a slightly different form of Spanish. Rather than me explain it just go to this link.

[spanish.about.com]

You'll see the use of the "vos" form in Benedetti's other work.

ola solo kiero saber coomo me pued descargar el emule a yudarme xfxfx gracias

[tinyurl.com]

de nada xoxoxo.

pokemon blue

and you can use IT
while in Portuguese ( and Spanish) for instance,
IT does not exist

which means a table is "feminine",
a book, masculine ... and so on ...

go figure !

Meowth That's Right !

So ... in Portuguese, if one were to translate,

Dick and Jane are reading a book. It is on the table.

Dick e Jane estão lendo um livro. Está na tabela.

One cannot tell whether Dick (or Jane) is on the table, or the book?

Weird.

I suppose you would need to depend on context, unless they were exaples in a grammar text, out of context.

Peter

We do know that Dick and Jane aren't both on the table.

pam

only the jack of hearts

buscar canciones

Cherchez la femme.

?Donde es mi tequila?

Thanks to Pam, Marian NYC, and Hugh for your in depth analysis.
first of all, i am uruguayan, so i will tell you the history behind "sos". in montevideo, the capital of uruguay and also in argentina, we use the " vos sos" instead of " tu eres", that in english means "you are". that is the reason, for some people that have studied spanish with a mexican or other latin country version, the vos and sos have sound wierd.

about the peom... i was getting married and i wanted the poem for the invitation. since my husband is from the US, i wanted it in english. finally we decided to go with another poem in the english invitations and for the spanish invitation, i use benedetti's poem in spanish. i recommend them to anyone who wants to read spanish poetry

anyaway, thanks a lot for your time. keep the discussion going!!!

Ilza said:
"and you can use IT
while in Portuguese ( and Spanish) for instance,
IT does not exist

which means a table is "feminine",
a book, masculine ... and so on ...

go figure !"

similarly in french. Usually, I speak english with my fiance, but he keeps on referring to spiders as she. Which of course, makes it utterly impossible for me to have them killed or even kicked out. It sounds so much more personal. So, here I am, lying awake at night wondering if that is a spider I am feeling in my hair, all because of language differences.

So, I was wrong about Sapir and Wholfe, in this case language DOES influence the way I interpret reality.

Aren't the female spiders usually the deadly ones? :)

Only to other spiders.

As I understand it, female spiders are often a lot bigger than the males and poisonous ones have more venom - so they are deadlier to everything!! This is presumably so they can defend themselves and their young. I'm not even sure that the males of poisonous species have venom - they might be tempted to try and kill their mates when attacked by them, which would be counterproductive for the species.

In the wider field, I'm sure only female (worker)honey bees and probably female ants are venomous, not the males. Most things which have venom in both sexes aren't agressive to their own species or aren't susceptible to their own venom.

I wonder if regarding poison as a woman's weapon is partly based on its predominance in females of the species in the rest of nature.

very interesting. I'm happy we don't have venomous spiders here in france!

I also know that some spiders kill and eat their mates after sex. Very independent creatures.

Hmmm ... isn't araignée masculine? Or perhaps you have 'black widow' spiders - eeek!

araignee is feminine. And luckily no big dangerous lethal spiders in europe. One of the reasons I do not want to live in Africa. Spiders are really the only thing I can irrationaly panic over.

Of course it is. The extra 'e' on the end should have been my first clue. I was once threatened by a tarantula while visiting my parents in Arkansas way back when. I was getting the morning paper from our driveway when one came out from under our car parked there. It (she) rose up on her back legs and waved her front ones at me. I got the message, beating a hasty retreat, leaving her the whole neighborhood should she want it!

I need the english translation of this poem of Benedetti. Thanks :)



Aunque tu no lo sepas



Como la luz de un sueño,
que no raya en el mundo pero existe,
así he vivido yo,
iluminando
esa parte de ti que no conoces,
la vida que has llevado junto a mis pensamientos.

Y aunque no lo sepas, yo te he visto
cruzar la puerta sin decir que no,
pedirme un cenicero, curiosear libros,
responder al deseo de mis labios
con tus labios de whisky,
seguir mis pasos hasta el dormitorio.

También hemos hablado
en la cama, sin prisa, muchas tardes,
esta cama de amor que no conoces,
la misma que se queda
fría cuando te marchas.

Aunque tú no lo sepas, te inventaba conmigo,
hicimos mil proyectos, paseamos
por todas las ciudades que te gustan,
recordamos canciones, elegimos renuncias,
aprendiendo los dos a convivir
entre la realidad y el pensamiento.

Espiada a la sombra de tu horario
o en la noche de un bar por sorpresa.

Así he vivido yo,
como la luz del sueño
que no recuerdas cuando te despiertas

"The only thing we have to fear....is SPIDERS"
Franklin Delano Rachnaphobia

hmm. How did we end up talking about deadly spiders after such a beautiful poem?

Translating poems is very difficult, I am bilingual (english and spanish).
In Colombia as in other latin american countries sos can be used in everyday language meaning your are from the verb SER (a permanent state of being).

About the last poem I'll think about it and come back later.

Sorry, El tiempo es oro! :-)