Notas al margen
A veces las notas son feroces,
escaramuzas contra el autor
propagándose a lo largo de los márgenes de cada página
en minúsculas letras negras.
Si pudiera ponerte las manos encima,
Kierkegaard, o Conor Cruise O'Brien,
parecen decir,
cerraría la puerta y metería algo de lógica en tu cabeza.
Otros comentarios son más improvisados, despectivos-
‘Disparates.’ ‘¡Por favor!’ ‘¡Ja!’
ese tipo de cosas.
Recuerdo una vez al levantar la vista de la lectura,
mi pulgar como señalador,
tratando de imaginar cómo sería la persona,
por qué escribió ‘No seas tonto’
junto a un párrafo en La vida de Emily Dickinson.
Los estudiantes son más modestos
solo necesitan dejar sus huellas esparcidas
a lo largo del margen de la página.
Uno garabatea ‘Metáfora’ junto a una estrofa de Eliot.
Otra marca la presencia de ‘Ironía’
cincuenta veces fuera de los párrafos de Una modesta proposición.
O son fanáticos que animan desde las gradas vacías,
manos ahuecadas alrededor de sus bocas.
“Totalmente”, gritan
a Duns Scotus y a James Baldwin.
‘Sí.’ ‘Obejtivo’ ‘¡Mi hombre!’
Tildes, asteriscos y signos de exclamación
llueven por las líneas marginales.
Y si lograste graduarte de la universidad
sin haber escrito ‘Hombre contra la Naturaleza’
en un margen, tal vez ahora
sea el momento de dar un paso adelante.
Todos hemos nos hemos apoderado del perímetro blanco como nuestro
y solo buscamos una lapicera para demostrar
que no nos quedamos en un sillón cambiando de página;
presionamos un pensamiento en el camino,
clavamos una marca en el margen.
Incluso los monjes irlandeses en sus fríos escritorios
anotaron en los márgenes de los Evangelios
breves comentarios sobre el dolor de copiar,
un pájaro firma cerca de sus ventanas,
o la luz del sol que iluminaba su página-
hombres anónimos atrapados en el futuro
en un barco más perdurable que ellos mismos.
Y no has leído a Joshua Reynolds,
dicen, hasta que lo hayas leído
rodeado por los furiosos garabatos de Blake.
Sin embargo, en la que pienso con más seguido,
y cuelga de mí como un relicario,
estaba escrito en la copia de El cazador oculto
que tomé prestada de la biblioteca local
en un verano largo y caluroso.
Yo recién empezaba la secundaria,
leyendo libros en un sofá en el living de mis padres,
no puedo decirte
cuánto se ahondó mi soledad,
qué conmovedor y amplificado parecía el mundo ante mí,
cuando encontré en una página
unas pocas manchas de aspecto grasoso
y junto a ellas, escrito en lápiz blando-
por una hermosa niña, a quien
puedo decir nunca conoceré-
‘Disculpe las manchas de ensalada de huevo, pero estoy enamorada’.
Billy Collins, Manhattan, 1941
Versión ©Silvia Camerotto
imagen de Gemma-Rose Turnbull
Marginalia
Sometimes the notes are ferocious,
skirmishes against the author
raging along the borders of every page
in tiny black script.
If I could just get my hands on you,
Kierkegaard, or Conor Cruise O'Brien,
they seem to say,
I would bolt the door and beat some logic into your head.
Other comments are more offhand, dismissive -
'Nonsense.' 'Please! ' 'HA!! ' -
that kind of thing.
I remember once looking up from my reading,
my thumb as a bookmark,
trying to imagine what the person must look like
why wrote 'Don't be a ninny'
alongside a paragraph in The Life of Emily Dickinson.
Students are more modest
needing to leave only their splayed footprints
along the shore of the page.
One scrawls 'Metaphor' next to a stanza of Eliot's.
Another notes the presence of 'Irony'
fifty times outside the paragraphs of A Modest Proposal.
Or they are fans who cheer from the empty bleachers,
Hands cupped around their mouths.
'Absolutely,' they shout
to Duns Scotus and James Baldwin.
'Yes.' 'Bull's-eye.' 'My man! '
Check marks, asterisks, and exclamation points
rain down along the sidelines.
skirmishes against the author
raging along the borders of every page
in tiny black script.
If I could just get my hands on you,
Kierkegaard, or Conor Cruise O'Brien,
they seem to say,
I would bolt the door and beat some logic into your head.
Other comments are more offhand, dismissive -
'Nonsense.' 'Please! ' 'HA!! ' -
that kind of thing.
I remember once looking up from my reading,
my thumb as a bookmark,
trying to imagine what the person must look like
why wrote 'Don't be a ninny'
alongside a paragraph in The Life of Emily Dickinson.
Students are more modest
needing to leave only their splayed footprints
along the shore of the page.
One scrawls 'Metaphor' next to a stanza of Eliot's.
Another notes the presence of 'Irony'
fifty times outside the paragraphs of A Modest Proposal.
Or they are fans who cheer from the empty bleachers,
Hands cupped around their mouths.
'Absolutely,' they shout
to Duns Scotus and James Baldwin.
'Yes.' 'Bull's-eye.' 'My man! '
Check marks, asterisks, and exclamation points
rain down along the sidelines.
And if you have managed to graduate from college
without ever having written 'Man vs. Nature'
in a margin, perhaps now
is the time to take one step forward.
We have all seized the white perimeter as our own
and reached for a pen if only to show
we did not just laze in an armchair turning pages;
we pressed a thought into the wayside,
planted an impression along the verge.
Even Irish monks in their cold scriptoria
jotted along the borders of the Gospels
brief asides about the pains of copying,
a bird signing near their window,
or the sunlight that illuminated their page-
anonymous men catching a ride into the future
on a vessel more lasting than themselves.
and reached for a pen if only to show
we did not just laze in an armchair turning pages;
we pressed a thought into the wayside,
planted an impression along the verge.
Even Irish monks in their cold scriptoria
jotted along the borders of the Gospels
brief asides about the pains of copying,
a bird signing near their window,
or the sunlight that illuminated their page-
anonymous men catching a ride into the future
on a vessel more lasting than themselves.
And you have not read Joshua Reynolds,
they say, until you have read him
enwreathed with Blake's furious scribbling.
Yet the one I think of most often,
the one that dangles from me like a locket,
was written in the copy of Catcher in the Rye
I borrowed from the local library
one slow, hot summer.
I was just beginning high school then,
reading books on a davenport in my parents' living room,
and I cannot tell you
how vastly my loneliness was deepened,
how poignant and amplified the world before me seemed,
when I found on one page
A few greasy looking smears
and next to them, written in soft pencil-
by a beautiful girl, I could tell,
whom I would never meet-
'Pardon the egg salad stains, but I'm in love.'
they say, until you have read him
enwreathed with Blake's furious scribbling.
Yet the one I think of most often,
the one that dangles from me like a locket,
was written in the copy of Catcher in the Rye
I borrowed from the local library
one slow, hot summer.
I was just beginning high school then,
reading books on a davenport in my parents' living room,
and I cannot tell you
how vastly my loneliness was deepened,
how poignant and amplified the world before me seemed,
when I found on one page
A few greasy looking smears
and next to them, written in soft pencil-
by a beautiful girl, I could tell,
whom I would never meet-
'Pardon the egg salad stains, but I'm in love.'
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