Laura Nagle

A Translation from the Spanish of "Autumn" by Adela Zamudio 

Already the mountain is coated in snow;

Cold and merciless the winds descend.

Dense is the fog that covers the horizon;

Dry and bare are the meadow, the plain.

The frostbitten wind is a bully, a brute.

The trees are powerless to defend

Their leaves from its wrath, and seeing the forest

All in yellow fills the heart with pain.

How sudden, how abrupt this change of season,

Destruction and sadness intertwined!

So, too, must human hearts, by age enfeebled,

Lose all hope and be consumed with grief.

I am not immune to that chill in the heart,

Even though my brow is yet unlined;

For the wind heralds winter’s desolation,

And for such sorrow there’s no relief.

Adela Zamudio (1854–1928) was a writer, activist, and educator from Cochabamba, Bolivia. Often using the pen name Soledad, she published numerous essays, poems, and short stories, as well as one novel, Íntimas. She was honored in 1926 by presidential decree as “the greatest exemplar of culture in Bolivia” and is perhaps best remembered today as a pioneer in her country’s feminist movement.

Laura Nagle is a translator and writer based in Indianapolis. Her translations of prose and poetry from French and Spanish have appeared in journals including AGNI, The Southern Review, Gulf Coast, and Presence, and her short fiction has recently appeared or is forthcoming in The Common, North American Review, and Stanchion. Her translation of Prosper Mérimée’s 1827 hoax, La Guzla, was published in 2023 by Frayed Edge Press.