More on Vallejo's poetry in english

The black heralds

There are some blows in life, so hard... I don't know!
As from the hatred of God, as if in front of them
the back undercurrents of all suffering
welled up in the soul... I don't know!

They are few; but they are... And open obscure crevasses
in the fiercest face and in the hardest back.
They might be the horses of barbarous atilas,
or the black heralds that Death sends to us.

They are the pitfalls of the Christs of our souls,
of some adorable faith that Destiny blasfames.
Those bloody blows are the cracklings
of some bread loaves burnt just at the oven door.

And man... poor him... poor him! Turns up his eyes, as
when a pat upon his shoulder calls him from behind;
turns up his maddened eyes, and everything lived by him
wells up, as a pond of guilt, in his look.

There are some blows in life, so hard... I don't know!