Asilo de anciáns
Todos posúen un límite: cada un
Ten un matiz de dano moi distinto. A elite
É capaz de arranxarse por si mesma,
Camiñar apoiada nun bastón,
Ler completo un libro, interpretar
Movementos de fáciles sonatas.
(Pero seica a liberdade carnal
É o veleno do espírito:
Conscientes do que sucedeu e o porqué
Abominan a súa tristeza sen bágoas.)
Logo veñen os de cadeira de rodas, a media
Que soporta a tele
E guiado por amables terapeutas
Canta en comunidade.
Despois os senlleiros que bisban
Palabras no limbo, e ao final
Os que xa son do todo incompetentes
E como unha parodia das plantas
(Elas poden suar sen ensuciarse).
Con todo, hai algo que os une:
Todos apareceron cando o mundo,
A pesar dos seus males,
Era máis habitable e máis vistoso
E os vellos tiñan auditorio
E un lugar na terra.
(O neno reprendido pola súa nai
Podía refuxiarse coa avoa para ser consolado
E escoitar algún conto.)
Hoxe xa todos sabemos que esperar,
Mais a súa xeración é a primeira
Que esvaeuse deste xeito:
Non en casa senón asignada a un pavillón, arroxada
Como se arrumban fardos indesexables.
Mentres vou no Metro para estar
Media hora cunha do asilo,
Recordo quen foi ela no seu esplendor.
Entón visitala era un orgullo
E non unha caridade.
Serei tan frío como para esperar
Un somnífero rápido, indoloro;
Ou ben para rogar, como ela roga,
Que Deus ou a natureza precipiten
A súa función terreal?
Old People's Home
All are limitory, but each has her own
nuance of damage. The elite can dress and decent themselves,
are ambulant with a single stick, adroit
to read a book all through, or play the slow movements of
easy sonatas. (Yet, perhaps their very
carnal freedom is their spirit's bane: intelligent
of what has happened and why, they are obnoxious
to a glum beyond tears.) Then come those on wheels, the average
majority, who endure T.V. and, led by
lenient therapists, do community-singing, then
the loners, muttering in Limbo, and last
the terminally incompetent, as improvident,
unspeakable, impeccable as the plants
they parody. (Plants may sweat profusely but never
sully themselves.) One tie, though, unites them: all
appeared when the world, though much was awry there, was more
spacious, more comely to look at, it's Old Ones
with an audience and secular station. Then a child,
in dismay with Mamma, could refuge with Gran
to be revalued and told a story. As of now,
we all know what to expect, but their generation
is the first to fade like this, not at home but assigned
to a numbered frequent ward, stowed out of conscience
as unpopular luggage.
As I ride the subway
to spend half-an-hour with one, I revisage
who she was in the pomp and sumpture of her hey-day,
when week-end visits were a presumptive joy,
not a good work. Am I cold to wish for a speedy
painless dormition, pray, as I know she prays,
that God or Nature will abrupt her earthly function?
Poema W.H. Auden
Fotogramas do filme de animación "Arrugas" (2011), dirixida por Ignacio Ferreras
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