I have been a professor for about a month now, and it is both delightful and exhausting. So far, not terribly conducive to writing, but hopefully that will change as I settle in. I got home today after a long day at the office (I read those words and think—who is this? Alaya? Office? Everything really will happen) and was browsing through my old music collection, the one that’s not streaming, the one that I bought or downloaded some way or another years ago, when that was a thing you did, and I turned up a couple of old demos from when I was regularly writing songs. The delight I felt upon listening to old me sing her heart out was unalloyed. It was like talking to my best friend. She knew me so well! Ugh, why does she always have to go slightly out of tune when she dives for the low notes? I wanted her to be better and I loved her anyway.
I never shared the few songs I wrote in Spanish with my old band, Cananea. I think I was embarrassed to sing with my accent. One of our songs, The Rules of the Land, does have a coda in Spanish, though. I think I’ll share that here soon, since it is also the second in a song cycle with a whole story and world attached. That song was the basis of my short story of the same title that appeared in A Phoenix First Must Burn edited by Patrice Caldwell, several years ago now. It’s strange how all of these projects don’t feel over in my mind, although they’ve been suspended since the pandemic. Listening to my old self makes me want to sing again. It makes me want to write songs again. I didn’t bring my guitar to the US this trip, though. I thought about it, but I said, “when will I have the time?”
It’s true, I don’t have a lot of free time right now. But time is also what you give to yourself. I’ve had fragments of songs in my head for the last year, but I haven’t let them live. It’s easy for me to forget that I have that voice inside of me. That I want to tell stories in music with words and voice. That I can mix all of these art forms into something that pulls me along in its wake, and teaches me about who I am in the world, and what the world is in me. I struggle with the idea that I want to share my art, especially when it involves singing. Unlike a novelist, a singer is pushing herself at you, forcing your awareness of her as a person, an actor, a mover. Writing seems more pleasantly transparent to me. Especially fiction writing, where I have a whole cast of characters and a different world to hide behind. Pay no attention to the Alaya behind the book cover. My songs, on the other hand, do not equivocate. They demand. They share. They are not ashamed. And I guess maybe I think I should be ashamed, and then I am ashamed, and then I don’t want to sing.
But I’ve always wanted to sing.
Anyway, this track is one of my few Spanish-language songs—grammatically correct as far as I can tell, but built around a funny translation slip. I won’t say “error” because in poetry these shifts in meaning between similar-sounding words in related languages (the “false friends” phenomenon) end up giving more meaning than they take away. I wrote “todo va a pasar” thinking that I was saying “everything will pass” but in Spanish, it really means “everything will happen.”
Esta vida es lo que sale
Entre dos infinidades
Todo va a pasar…
[This life is what goes
Between two infinities
Everything will happen…]
And isn’t that what I meant, really? Because everything will happen, everything will end. In the meantime, I’ll be a little pushy, I’ll sing in my funny accent, I’ll come up for air, I’ll sit down and tell you about it.
Todo va a pasar (letra en español) Tienes los ojos tan bonitos En el universo infinito Pero ya se Todo va a pasar… En la calle hay protestas Pero mañana siluetas Porque ya sé Todo va a pasar… Ojalá no se marchiten Pero por lo menos viven Y aman y cogen y escriben Canciones Y aunque no dura La rosa es tan hermosa Con el olor efímero Que me recuerda a todo que voy a perder Ayer fue templos y canales Hoy centros comerciales Porque ya sé Todo va a pasar… Esta la vida es lo que sale Entre dos infinidades Pa’ que sepas Todo va a pasar… Ojalá no se marchiten Pero por lo menos viven Y aman y cogen y escriben Canciones Y aunque no dura La rosa es tan hermosa Con el olor efímero Que me recuerda a todo que voy a perder Tienes los ojos tan bonitos En el universo infinito Everything will happen (lyrics in English translation) You have such beautiful eyes In the infinite universe Because I know Everything will happen… There are protests in the streets But tomorrow silhouettes Because I know Everything will happen… I wish they wouldn’t wither But at least they live And love and fuck and write Songs And even though it doesn’t last The rose is so beautiful With the ephemeral scent That reminds me of everything that I will lose Yesterday was temples and canals Today shopping malls Because I know Everything will happen… This life is what goes Between two infinities So you know Everything will happen… I wish they wouldn’t wither But at least they live And love and fuck and write Songs And even though it doesn’t last The rose is so beautiful With the ephemeral scent That reminds me of everything that I will lose You have such beautiful eyes In the infinite universe
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