The Borough

from Alfonsina Storni (1892-1938)

translated by Alex McKeown

Could it be that all I’ve ever felt in verse
was nothing more than what could never be?
Was nothing more than ever unquenched thirst
passed down by women through my family?

In my ancestral lands the people say
whatever must be done must be done
in moderation, and maybe that’s the way…
In my mother’s home a woman holds her tongue.

Sometimes I’d see her eyes light on a whim
of liberation, then, very slowly, dim
and sink into a bitter wave of tears.

But all the gnawing, beaten, mutilated
things locked within her soul, in all my years
of verse I feel I’ve almost liberated.

Original version

Pudiera ser que todo lo que en verso he sentido                   
no fuera más que aquello que nunca pudo ser,                      
no fuera más que algo vedado y reprimido                
de familia en familia, de mujer en mujer.                  

Dicen que en los solares de mi gente, medido                      
estaba todo aquello que se debía hacer…                   
Dicen que silenciosas las mujeres han sido               
de mi casa materna… Ah, bien pudiera ser…             

A veces en mi madre apuntaron antojos                    
de liberarse, pero, se le subió a los ojos                     
una honda amargura, y en la sombra lloró.                

Y todo esto mordiente, vencido, mutilado,               
todo esto que se hallaba en su alma encerrado,                     
pienso que sin quererlo lo he libertado yo.

Alex McKeown is a Tasmanian poet and translator. His work has appeared in Meanjin, Island, Australian Poetry Journal, Cordite and The Canberra Times. He is the author of We Leave Gaps (Walleah Press, 2025) and translator of Love in the Fields (Penteract Press, 2022)