César Vallejo

César Vallejo HOME The poem goes on to describe the speaker's despair and sense of isolation. His collection of peoms, "The Black Herald¨" as a whole -published in 1919-, is characterized by its dark and intense tone and explores themes such as death, alienation, and the struggle for meaning in a chaotic world.
César Vallejo The Black Heralds There are blows in life, so powerful . . . I don’t know! Blows as from the hatred of God; as if before them, the deep waters of everything lived through were backed up in the soul . . . I don’t know! They are few; but they are . . . They open dark trenches in the most ferocious face and in the most bull-like back. Perhaps they are the horses of that heathen Attila, or the black heralds sent to us by Death. They are the deep abysses of the soul of Spain nearing the flesh of bulls with a thousand walls, they are the harps that sound in the silence of the bodies and that birds peck at in order to silence them. They are the cracks of the bridges over rivers of blood, and the gardens of the sunset shudder with snakes, there are blows in life, so powerful . . . I don’t know! Paris, October 1936 From all of this I am the only one who leaves. From this bench I go away, from my pants, from my great situation, from my actions, from my number split side to side, from all of this I am the only one who leaves. From the Champs Elysées or as the strange alley of the Moon makes a turn, my death goes away, my cradle leaves, and, surrounded by people, alone, cut loose, my human resemblance turns around and dispatches its shadows one by one. And I move away from everything, since everything remains to create my alibi: my shoe, its eyelet, as well as its mud and even the bend in the elbow of my own buttoned shirt.

César Vallejo HOME

The poem goes on to describe the speaker's despair and sense of isolation. His collection of peoms, "The Black Herald¨" as a whole -published in 1919-, is characterized by its dark and intense tone and explores themes such as death, alienation, and the struggle for meaning in a chaotic world.

César Vallejo

The Black Heralds

There are blows in life, so powerful . . . I don’t know!
Blows as from the hatred of God; as if before them,
the deep waters of everything lived through
were backed up in the soul . . . I don’t know!

They are few; but they are . . . They open dark trenches
in the most ferocious face and in the most bull-like back.
Perhaps they are the horses of that heathen Attila,
or the black heralds sent to us by Death.

They are the deep abysses of the soul of Spain
nearing the flesh of bulls with a thousand walls,
they are the harps that sound in the silence of the bodies
and that birds peck at in order to silence them.

They are the cracks of the bridges over rivers of blood,
and the gardens of the sunset shudder with snakes,
there are blows in life, so powerful . . . I don’t know!

Paris, October 1936

From all of this I am the only one who leaves.
From this bench I go away, from my pants,
from my great situation, from my actions,
from my number split side to side,
from all of this I am the only one who leaves.

From the Champs Elysées or as the strange
alley of the Moon makes a turn,
my death goes away, my cradle leaves,
and, surrounded by people, alone, cut loose,
my human resemblance turns around
and dispatches its shadows one by one.

And I move away from everything, since everything
remains to create my alibi:
my shoe, its eyelet, as well as its mud
and even the bend in the elbow
of my own buttoned shirt.