About
So, I’m Trenton and this is my blog. I’m calling it “No Hay Camino” after a poem by Antonio Machado. I’ve pasted it down below, followed by a version in English. Perhaps what it means is that there is no purpose, no destination, but what counts is simply that we proceed, only the journey. And in the case of the blog, maybe it also means that it won’t be confined to thematic rules or guidelines; it might wander a bit. So, I ask for a bit of patience and a sense of adventure from you, the reader. Together we’ll see where this trail leads.
Todo pasa y todo queda,
pero lo nuestro es pasar,
pasar haciendo caminos,
caminos sobre el mar.
Nunca persequí la gloria,
ni dejar en la memoria
de los hombres mi canción;
yo amo los mundos sutiles,
ingrávidos y gentiles,
como pompas de jabón.
Me gusta verlos pintarse
de sol y grana, volar
bajo el cielo azul, temblar
súbitamente y quebrarse…
Nunca perseguí la gloria.
Caminante, son tus huellas
el camino y nada más;
caminante, no hay camino,
se hace camino al andar.
Al andar se hace camino
y al volver la vista atrás
se ve la senda que nunca
se ha de volver a pisar.
Caminante no hay camino
sino estelas en la mar…
Hace algún tiempo en ese lugar
donde hoy los bosques se visten de espinos
se oyó la voz de un poeta gritar
“Caminante no hay camino,
se hace camino al andar…”
Golpe a golpe, verso a verso…
Murió el poeta lejos del hogar.
Le cubre el polvo de un país vecino.
Al alejarse le vieron llorar.
“Caminante no hay camino,
se hace camino al andar…”
Golpe a golpe, verso a verso…
Cuando el jilguero no puede cantar.
Cuando el poeta es un peregrino,
cuando de nada nos sirve rezar.
“Caminante no hay camino,
se hace camino al andar…”
Golpe a golpe, verso a verso.
Everything passes and everything remains,
but we can only pass,
pass making paths,
paths over the sea.
I never sought glory,
nor to leave in man’s
memory my song;
I love the subtle worlds,
weightless and delicate,
like soap bubbles.
I like to see them painted
by sun and spots, fly
under the blue sky, then
tremble and burst…
I never sought glory.
Traveller, it’s your footprints
that are the path, nothing more;
Traveller, there is no path,
the path is made by walking.
By walking the path is made
and looking back
you see the trail
you will never tread again.
Traveller, there is no path,
only the wake upon the sea…
Some time ago in this place
where today the forests a full of hawthorns
you could hear the voice of a poet shout
“Traveller, there is no path,
the path is made by walking…”
Blow by blow, verse by verse…
The poet died far from home.
A foreign country’s dust covered him.
As they left they saw him crying.
“Traveller, there is no path,
the path is made by walking…”
Blow by blow, verse by verse…
When the finch cannot sing.
When the poet is a pilgrim,
when praying will do us no good.
“Traveller, there is no path,
the path is made by walking…”
Blow by blow, verse by verse.
beautiful poem. gives life’s sometime senselessness a bit of sense.
a very beautiful poem.thank you very much
Great, I was looking for the full version.
Thanks.
Pedro
Beautiful poem. Good luck with your blog.
This is one of my favorite poems. Machado was obligated to exile out of Spain during the Civil war. He loved his home country so he lived very closed to Spain, in the Spainsh-French line.
He could not return to Spain because he could be killed as other poets were.
So he waited his dead in the exile with a deep homesick. Sadly he knew that will happen in this way “Murió el poeta lejos del hogar. Le cubre el polvo de un país vecino”…
I think that Machado want to say in this poem that you have not to think in the past (mirar atrás) nor in the future (el camino), you have to just live.
Anyways the poem is beautiful, but is even more the story after it.
hi my name is Steve, i have one of these hats and im loking to buy a other one. can you tell me the storename in bolivia? perhaps they have a website? thanks for your help.
Hey Steve,
I didn’t buy the hat from a Bolivian store. In Bolivia, these hats are mostly sold from little market stalls. There’s no chance that they’d have a website. However, I actually bought my “Bolivian” hat in Chile. It was in a somewhat trendy little store in Santiago that sells products inspired by the indigenous cultures. I can’t remember the name of it for the life of me. But, maybe that’s something to go on.