Us

Nosotros
| a poem by Eduardo Galeano, translated from Spanish to English

Us
We have the joy of our joys
And we also have
The joy of our sorrows
Because we are not interested in the painless life
That the civilization of consumption
Sell in supermarkets
And we are proud
Of the price of so much pain
That for so much love we pay.

Us
We have the joy of our mistakes,
Trips that show the passion
Of walking and love on the road,
We have the joy of our defeats
Because the fight
For justice and beauty
They are worth it too when you lose
And above all we have
The joy of our hopes
In full fashion of disenchantment,
When disenchantment has become
In article of massive and universal consumption.

Us
We keep believing
In the amazing powers
Of the human embrace
I came home in the evening
And found it as I had left it:
Cage inside,
Glued to the bars,
Trembling from the fright of freedom.

Sources:
– Eduardo Galeano, Nosotros Decimos No. Cronicas, 1963-1988,  Tapa blanda: Madrid, 1989.