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Poetry

Prayer

By Gloria Fuertes
Translated from Spanish by Brian Barker

Our Father who is on earth,
whom I feel in the pine needle’s prick,
in the blue shirt of the worker,
in the child bent over her embroidery,
winding the thread around a finger.
Our Father who is on earth,
in the furrow,
in the orchard,
in the mine,
in the harbor,
in the cinema,
in the wine,
in the doctor’s office.
Our Father who is on earth,
where you reign over your glory and your hell,
and your limbo in the cafés
where the rich gather to drink.
Our Father who is in the public school,
and in the vegetable peddler
and in those that go hungry,
and in the poet, but never in the thief.
Our Father who is on earth,
an old man reading on a park bench in the Prado
or tossing bread to pigeons.
Our Father who is on earth,
in the cigarette, in the kiss,
in the ear of corn, in the chests
of all those who are decent.
Father who lives anywhere.
God who penetrates all emptiness,
you who end pain, who is on earth.
Our father whom now we see,
and those who will see you soon
here or in heaven.

English

Our Father who is on earth,
whom I feel in the pine needle’s prick,
in the blue shirt of the worker,
in the child bent over her embroidery,
winding the thread around a finger.
Our Father who is on earth,
in the furrow,
in the orchard,
in the mine,
in the harbor,
in the cinema,
in the wine,
in the doctor’s office.
Our Father who is on earth,
where you reign over your glory and your hell,
and your limbo in the cafés
where the rich gather to drink.
Our Father who is in the public school,
and in the vegetable peddler
and in those that go hungry,
and in the poet, but never in the thief.
Our Father who is on earth,
an old man reading on a park bench in the Prado
or tossing bread to pigeons.
Our Father who is on earth,
in the cigarette, in the kiss,
in the ear of corn, in the chests
of all those who are decent.
Father who lives anywhere.
God who penetrates all emptiness,
you who end pain, who is on earth.
Our father whom now we see,
and those who will see you soon
here or in heaven.

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