Antonio Porchia Quotes
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Antonio Porchia was an Argentinian poet. He was born in Conflenti, Italy, but, after the death of his father in 1900, moved to Argentina. He wrote a Spanish book entitled Voces , a book of aphorisms. It has since been translated into Italian and into English , French, and German. A very influential, yet extremely succinct writer, he has been a cult author for a number of renowned figures of contemporary literature and thought such as André Breton, Jorge Luis Borges, Don Paterson, Roberto Juarroz and Henry Miller, amongst others. Some critics have paralleled his work to Japanese haiku and found many similarities with a number of Zen schools of thought. Wikipedia  

✵ 13. November 1885 – 9. November 1968
Antonio Porchia: 276   quotes 17   likes

Antonio Porchia Quotes

“I will help you approach if you approach, and to keep away if you keep away.”

Te ayudaré a venir si vienes y a no venir si no vienes.
Voces (1943)

“If only I could leave everything as it is, without moving a single star or a single cloud. Oh, if only I could!”

Si pudiera dejar todo como está, sin mover ni una estrella, ni una nube. ¡Ah, si pudiera!
Voces (1943)

“All that can’t be is almost always a reproach against what can be.”

Cuanto no puede ser, casi siempre es un reproche a cuanto puede ser.
Voces (1943)

“They are like me, I tell myself. And in that way I protect myself against them. And in that way I protect myself against myself.”

Ellos también son como yo, me digo. Y así me defiendo de ellos. Y así me defiendo de mí.
Voces (1943)

“Sometimes I believe that evil is everything, and that good is only a beautiful desire for evil.”

A veces creo el mal es todo y que el bien es sólo un bello deseo del mal.
Voces (1943)

“He always gave himself to everyone without following anyone. And in that world, where almost everyone follows everyone without giving themselves to anyone.”

Se daba a todos sin seguir a nadie. Y en aquel mundo, donde casi todos siguen a todos sin darse a nadie.
Voces (1943)

“I love for the sake of what I have loved, and what I have loved I would not go back to loving.”

Quiero por lo que quise, y lo que quise, no volvería a quererlo.
Voces (1943)

“My father, when he went, made my childhood a gift of half century.”

Mi padre, al irse, regaló medio siglo a mi niñez.
Voces (1943)

“Pain doesn’t follow us; it walks up front.”

El dolor no nos sigue: camina adelante.
Voces (1943)

“Don’t uncover, because there might be nothing. And nothing can’t be covered again.”

No descubras, que puede no haber nada. Y nada no se vuelve a cubrir.
Voces (1943)

“In a full heart there is room for everything. In an empty heart there is room for nothing.”

En una alma llena cabe todo y en una alma vacía no cabe nada.
Voces (1943)

“My dead go on suffering in me the pain of living.”

Mis muertos siguen sufriendo el dolor de la vida en mí.
Voces (1943)

“A little candor never leaves me. It is what protects me.”

Un poco de ingenuidad nunca se aparta de mí. Y es ella la que me protege.
Voces (1943)

“And if you find everything as soon as you look for it, you find it in vain, you look for it in vain.”

Y si cuanto encuentras es en cuanto buscas, siempre, en vano encuentras, en vano buscas.
Voces (1943)

“When I do not walk in the clouds I walk as though I were lost.”

Cuando no ando en las nubes, ando como perdido.
Voces (1943)

“Every toy has the right to break.”

Todo juguete tiene derecho a romperse.
Voces (1943)

“Sometimes it as though I were in hell and I do not grieve. I do not find anything to grieve over.”

A veces estoy en un infierno y no me lamento. No encuentro de qué lamentarme.
Voces (1943)

“Among the superficial, if you are not one of them, one of them has to lead you by the hand.”

En lo superficial, si no eres superficial, necesitas que te lleve de la mano alguien superficial.
Voces (1943)

“Don’t speak to me. I want to be with you.”

Voces (1943)

“I’ve abandoned the beggarly need to live. I live without it.”

He abandonado la indigente necesidad de vivir. Vivo sin ella.
Voces (1943)

“I do not agree with you, but if you do not agree with yourself either, then I agree with you.”

Yo no estoy conforme de ti. Pero si tú tampoco estás conforme de ti, yo estoy conforme de ti.
Voces (1943)

“My heaviness comes from the heights.”

Mi pesadez viene de los precipicios.
Voces (1943)

“Sometimes I find that misery is so vast that I am afraid of needing it.”

A veces hallo tan grande a la miseria que temo necesitar de ella.
Voces (1943)

“You wound and you will wound again. Because you wound and then you go away. You do not stay with the wound.”

Hieres y volverás a herir. Porque hieres y te apartas. No acompañas a la herida.
Voces (1943)

“Some things become so completely our own that we forget them.”

Algunas cosas se hacen tan nuestras que las olvidamos.
Voces (1943)

“It won’t be able to wait for you any longer. Because you have arrived.”

No podrá esperarte más. Porque has llegado.
Voces (1943)

“I have hardly touched the clay and I am made of it.”

Casi no he tocado el barro y soy de barro.
Voces (1943)

“The fear of separation is all that unites.”

El temor de separación es todo lo que une.
Voces (1943)

“Troubles also pass, as everything passes, without trouble.”

Las dificultades también pasan, como todo pasa, sin dificultad.
Voces (1943)

“The soul of all is only the soul of each one.”

El alma de todos sólo es el alma de cada uno.
Voces (1943)

“And why should I regret what I have done, when I cannot help doing what I do, which is what I have done?”

¿Y para qué debo arrepentirme de lo que he hecho, si no puedo dejar de hacer lo que hago, que es lo que he hecho?
Voces (1943)

“Men and things rise, fall, move away, approach. Everything is a comedy of distances.”

Hombres y cosas, suben, bajan, se alejan, se acercan. Todo es una comedia de distancias.
Voces (1943)

“And if you became man, what else could you become?”

Y si llegaras a hombre, ¿a qué más podrías llegar?
Voces (1943)

“A great deal that I no longer continue in myself continues there on its own.”

Mucho de lo he dejado de hacer en mí, sigue haciéndose en mí, solo.
Voces (1943)

“In order to reach some heights, I don’t lower them: I raise them higher.”

Para poder alcanzar ciertas alturas, no las bajo: las levanto más.
Voces (1943)

“Nothing is not only nothing. It is also our prison.”

Nada no es solamente nada. Es también nuestra cárcel.
Voces (1943)

“In full light we are not even a shadow.”

En plena luz no somos ni una sombra.
Voces (1943)

“All the suns labor to kindle your flame and a microbe puts it out.”

Todos los soles se esfuerzan en encender tu llama y un microbio la extingue.
Voces (1943)

“When I believe a stone is a stone and a cloud a cloud, I am in a state of unconsciousness.”

Cuando creo que la piedra es piedra, que la nube es nube, me hallo es un estado de inconsciencia.
Voces (1943)

“Human suffering, while it is asleep, is shapeless. If it is wakened it takes the form of the waker.”

La pena humana, durmiendo, no tiene forma. Si la despiertan, toma la forma de quien la despierta,
Voces (1943)

“Out of hundred years, a few moments were made that stayed with me, not a hundred years.”

Me hicieron de cien años algunos minutos que se quedaron conmigo, no cien años.
Voces (1943)

“Yes, I am preoccupied with myself. But I've forgotten what that means.”

Sí, me ocupo de mí, pero he olvidado qué significa ocuparme de mí.
Voces (1943)

“Man, when he realizes that he is an object of comedy, does not laugh.”

El hombre, cuando sabe que es una cosa cómica, no ríe.
Voces (1943)

“My truths do not last long in me, not as long as those that are not mine.”

Mis verdades duran poco en mí: menos que las ajenas.
Voces (1943)

“One man alone is too much for one man alone.”

Voces (1943)