Birches (Robert Frost)

When I see birches bend to left and right
Across the lines of straighter darker trees,
I like to think some boy's been swinging them.
But swinging doesn't bend them down to stay
As ice-storms do. Often you must have seen them
Loaded with ice a sunny winter morning
After a rain. They click upon themselves
As the breeze rises, and turn many-colored
As the stir cracks and crazes their enamel.
Soon the sun's warmth makes them shed crystal shells
Shattering and avalanching on the snow-crust—
Such heaps of broken glass to sweep away
You'd think the inner dome of heaven had fallen.
They are dragged to the withered bracken by the load,
And they seem not to break; though once they are bowed
So low for long, they never right themselves:
You may see their trunks arching in the woods
Years afterwards, trailing their leaves on the ground
Like girls on hands and knees that throw their hair
Before them over their heads to dry in the sun.
But I was going to say when Truth broke in
With all her matter-of-fact about the ice-storm
I should prefer to have some boy bend them
As he went out and in to fetch the cows—
Some boy too far from town to learn baseball,
Whose only play was what he found himself,
Summer or winter, and could play alone.
One by one he subdued his father's trees
By riding them down over and over again
Until he took the stiffness out of them,
And not one but hung limp, not one was left
For him to conquer. He learned all there was
To learn about not launching out too soon
And so not carrying the tree away
Clear to the ground. He always kept his poise
To the top branches, climbing carefully
With the same pains you use to fill a cup
Up to the brim, and even above the brim.
Then he flung outward, feet first, with a swish,
Kicking his way down through the air to the ground.
So was I once myself a swinger of birches.
And so I dream of going back to be.
It's when I'm weary of considerations,
And life is too much like a pathless wood
Where your face burns and tickles with the cobwebs
Broken across it, and one eye is weeping
From a twig's having lashed across it open.
I'd like to get away from earth awhile
And then come back to it and begin over.
May no fate willfully misunderstand me
And half grant what I wish and snatch me away
Not to return. Earth's the right place for love:
I don't know where it's likely to go better.
I'd like to go by climbing a birch tree,
And climb black branches up a snow-white trunk
Toward heaven, till the tree could bear no more,
But dipped its top and set me down again.
That would be good both going and coming back.
One could do worse than be a swinger of birches.

_______
Bétulas

Se à sestra e à destra as bétulas curvando-se
eu vejo, em meio às árvores mais negras,
me apraz pensar balança-as um menino.
Mas balouçar algum faz dobras fixas
tais quais borrascas fazem. É frequente.
Já deves tê-las visto, atarantadas
de gelo, em invernais manhãs-solares,
após chover. E, ao se tique-tocarem
quando as a brisa abraça, ficam furta-
cor, pois craquela e quebra-se o verniz.
Logo o sol morno faz-lhes descamar
conchas-cristais, que caem -- avalanche:
são tantos estilhaços por varrer,
dar-se-ia a cúpula dos céus quedada.
Seu fardo aterra-as na relva rota
sem parecer quebrá-las; mas, por longo
esse aterrá-las, nunca se endireitam:
tu podes ver os troncos arqueados
anos após; no chão, folhas se arrastam,
cabelos de mulher que, ajoelhada,
os lança a sua frente e os seca ao sol.
Mas eu diria (a Verdade invadiu
com seus fatos-são-fatos sobre tudo):
preferia um menino a balançá-las,
conforme andasse a pastorar as vacas --
guri longe demais do futebol,
cujo brincar fora somente o que --
verão, inverno -- achasse e, só, jogasse.
Uma por uma, as árvores do pai,
ele as venceu, montando-as sempre, sempre,
até a rigidez abandoná-las;
e irreverente, ali, restou nem uma
sequer por conquistar. Aprendeu tudo
sobre cedo demais não se elançar
e, assim, findar por não trazer à terra
aquela árvore. Sempre mirava,
ao escalar, galhos mais altos, vivo
das dores e atenção daquele que enche
um copo até a boca, e além da boca.
E, então, se arremessava, os pés primeiro
a -- zup! -- chutar o ar e aterrissar.
Também outrora o fui: balouça-bétulas.
E meu sonho é poder voltar a sê-lo.
Quando me cansam considerações,
e a vida vira selva sem sentido,
e o rosto se incomoda por atrá-
vessar teias de aranha, e um olho chora
a surpresa do encontro com um galho...
Quem me dera fugir por um momento
da terra, e então voltar, partir do zero.
Destino, sem-querer-querendo, não
me entendas mal, nem mal me atendas: não
me leves para não voltar. Amar
é só na Terra: outro lugar não há.
Queria era escalar uma das bétulas,
montando, rumo aos céus, os galhos negros
do níveo tronco, até, farta de mim,
ela, curvando a copa, aterrissasse-me.
Assim, seria bom ir-me e voltar.
Faz-se pior que ser balouça-bétulas.