I am not I

 


I Am Not I
I am not I.
I am this one
walking beside me whom I do not see,
whom at times I manage to visit,
and whom at other times I forget;
who remains calm and silent while I talk,
and forgives, gently, when I hate,
who walks where I am not,
who will remain standing when I die.
translated by Robert Bly


Juan Ramón Jiménez
(1881-1958)
Spanish poet, won the Nobel Prize for literature in 1956.