The Mimosa Tree


Recently we talked about the exemplum of a flower. Some days later, in a spirit still attentive to the teachings of the natural world, I found a beautiful version of “El aromo”, “The Mimosa Tree” on an album by Soledad Villamil (an actress I like very much who, besides acting, also sings). This milonga is a collaboration between the Argentine singer Atahualpa Yupanqui and the Uruguayan poet Romildo Risso, also the composers of “Los ejes de mi carreta”, “The axles of my cart” – see below –, whose similarity to this song was immediately discovered by the attentive ear of Tamás.


“Soledad Villamil Canta” (Sony Music 2007)

El Aromo
(milonga)
Romildo Risso - Atahualpa Yupanqui.

Hay un aromo nacido
en la grieta de una piedra.
Parece que la rompió
pa’ salir de adentro de ella.

Está en un alto pela’o,
no tiene ni un yuyo cerca,
Viéndolo solo y florido
Tuito el monte lo envidea.

Lo miran a la distancia
árboles y enredaderas,
diciéndose con rencor:
“¡Pa uno solo, cuánta tierra!”

En oro le ofrece al sol
pagar la luz que le presta.
Y como tiene de más,
puña’os por el suelo siembra.

Salud, plata y alegría,
tuito al aromo, la suebra
Asegún ven los demás
dende el lugar que lo observan.

Pero hay que dir y fijarse
como lo estruja la piedra.
Fijarse que es un martirio
la vida que le envidean.

Que en ese rajón, el árbol nació
por su mala estrella.
y en vez de morirse triste
se hace flores de sus penas…

Como no tiene reparo,
todos los vientos le pegan.
Las heladas lo castigan
L’agua pasa y no se queda.

Ansina vive el aromo
sin que ninguno lo sepa.
Con su poquito de orgullo
porque es justo que lo tenga.

Pero con l’alma tan linda
que no le brota una queja.
Que en vez de morirse triste
se hace flores de sus penas.

¡Eso habrían de envidiarle
los otros, si lo supieran!
The Mimosa Tree
(milonga)
Romildo Risso – Atahualpa Yupanqui

A mimosa tree was born
In the crevice of a rock
It is thought that he once cracked it
To escape from its insides.

Upright on a barren cliff
Not a weed is close at hand,
Seeing him so lone and blossomed
He’s the envy of the land.

Gazing at it from afar
Grudgingly, the trees and vines
All will murmur to each other
‘All that soil for only one.’

Gold he offers to the sun
As a payment for its light
And because of his abundance
Scatters handfuls to the ground.

Health and riches and contentment
The mimosa owns in plenty
In the eyes of all the others
Who are watching from their crannies.

But one must get quite close to notice
How the rock is pressing on him.
And discover what a martyr’s
Is the life that they all envy.

For the tree began his being
In that crack through his misfortune
But instead of sadly dying
Turns his sorrows into flowers.

As he lacks the slightest shelter
All the winds keep striking on him
And the frost is harsh upon him,
Water passes and won’t tarry.

The mimosa goes on living
No one knows these things about him.
He has his pride, but just a little,
What he’s justified in having.

So, with such a lovely spirit,
You will find him not complaining
And instead of sadly dying
Turns his sorrows into flowers.

This is really what the others,
If they knew it, should all envy.

As it unfortunately happens to me with so many works of Yupanqui, I had not known this milonga. But let us not complain, it is a luck to have found it. Perhaps it is true that some treasures come when we can really appreciate them, and this song is surely one of them.

The eloquent image of the mimosa tree standing proudly and all alone and struggling to find its place in the cleft of the rock reminded me an araucaria tree I had just seen in Neuquén.


But I was especially touched by the conflicting points of view and interests so poetically and precisely presented in the song. The envy of others seeing the mimosa tree as triumphant and glorious – as it happens so often to us when observing from outside the lives of others – and the truth of the tree which sacrifices itself and struggles to do its best in the place where destiny has brought it.

This song immediately recalls the ode by Machado, indissolubly linked with the melody by Serrat, to an old elm of the Duero.


As Julia has mentioned above “Los ejes de mi carreta”, let us also include it here. It has been my all-favorite from Atahualpa Yupanqui since Wang Wei showed it to me several years ago. Each time I listen to it, I always see the old Indian who gradually lost everything that had been dear in his life until he was left but one last companion, the creaking of the wheel.



Porque no engraso los ejes
me llaman abandonao
por que no engraso los ejes
me llaman abandonao…
Si a mí gusta que suenen
¿Pa’ qué los quiero engrasar?
Si a mí me gusta que suenen
¿Pa’ qué los quiero engrasar?

Es demasiado aburrido
seguir y seguir la huella.
Es demasiado aburrido
seguir y seguir la huella,
demasiado largo el camino
sin nada que me entretenga

No necesito silencio.
Yo no tengo en qué pensar.
No necesito silencio.
Yo no tengo en qué pensar.
Tenía, pero hace tiempo,
ahura ya no pienso mas.
Tenía, pero hace tiempo
ahura ya no pienso mas

Los ejes de mi carreta
nunca los voy a engrasar
Because I do not grease the axles
I am called a fool
because I do not grease the axles
I am called a fool
but if I love that sound
why should I grease them
but if I love that sound
why should I grease them

It is far too boring
to follow, to follow the track
it is far too boring
to follow, to follow the track
the way is far too long
with nothing to entertain me

I do not need silence
I have nothing to think about
I do not need silence
I have nothing to think about
I had, but long ago
now I do not think any more
I had, but long ago
now I do not think any more

and the axles of my cart
I will never grease

Atahualpa Yupanqui, 1908-2008

2 comentarios:

MOCKBA dijo...

When I first listened to these milongas, I didn't realize that they are much older than they appear in these records. El Aromo lyrics may be from the 30s; Los ejes de mi carreta letras y musica were published in 1946 (you can listen to 1947 Canaro's and Troilo's classic versions on TangoDC Letras site).

The dates, and the subtitle "milonga pampeana", are perfect signposts of a backlash to "Pianista Milonga Revolution", a movement, conceived and started by great Sebastián Piana, to rejuvenate the milonga genre by changing from milonga campera / milonga sureña of the South and the Pampas to milonga porteña of Buenos Aires and, later, milonga candombeanda.

15 years later, Yupanqui is moving this city girl back to the pampas again, completing the circle. Thanks for sharing!

languagehat dijo...

Oddly, aromo is not in any of my Spanish/English dictionaries, though it is in the Larousse diccionario usual.