To a Nose
Francisco de Quevedo

There was once a man who had a nose.
It was a most impressive nose,
the nose of a killer,
a writer's nose,
a hairy pointed sword of a nose.

It was a like a badly-shaped sundial,
pensive and still,
it was an elephant turned upside down,
it was Ovid's nose, but ... nosier.

It was like the breakwater from a galley,
it was an Egyptian pyramid,
it was the twelve tribes of noses.

It was a peach of a nose,
An infinite mass of nose,
A nose
so
fierce.

--- Translated from the Spanish by Thomas Franchi
For The Times Stephen Spender Prize 2012:
14-and-under, Second Prize

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A una nariz

Érase un hombre a una nariz pegado,
érase una nariz superlativa,
érase una nariz sayón y escriba,
érase un peje espada muy barbado.

Era un reloj de sol mal encarado,
érase una alquitara pensativa,
érase un elefante boca arriba,
era Ovidio Nasón más narizado.

Érase un espolón de una galera,
érase una pirámide de Egipto,
las doce Tribus de narices era.

Érase un naricísimo infinito,
muchísimo nariz, nariz tan fiera.

--- Francisco de Quevedo