Singer Jorge Ortiz (left) and bandleader Miguel Caló, 1943.
Pa' Qué Seguir?
("Why go on?")
Music: Francisco Fiorentino
Lyrics: Pedro Lloret
Recorded by Orquesta Típica Miguel Caló with vocal by Jorge Ortiz on 19 January 1943. Odeon 8372 12494
English-language version by Michael Krugman for TangoDecoder.com. All Rights Reserved.
This time in American history has a certain epochal finality to it—the age of democracy seems to be coming to an end. My musical soundtrack for this moment is Pá qué seguir.
"Why go on?"
| Con la noche enfrente, revolviéndome, dolorosamente a mi conciencia pregunté: Pa' qué seguir? Cada paso por la vida es un fracaso, es una herida más Mientras que luchando por no ser y por vivir, me despedazan el deber y mi sentir. Y por pensar cuando volvió llorando, buscando mi piedad, pidiendo mi perdón, mirándola en el barro más la hundí riéndome; llorándola después, después cuando al partir, vivía el drama de estar solo, solo con la voz de mi sentir. [Trágico dilema, drama sin final, llama en que se queman tantas ansias, tanto mal, por este amor que me llora su agonía hora tras hora... mas, todavía mas. Noches y más noches sin morir, no vivo yo mas que una angustia dolorosamente atroz.] |
With the night ahead of me, tossing and turning... I painfully question my conscience: Why go on? Each step in life is a disaster, is one more wound. While I’m wrestling with living and dying, duty and my feelings are tearing me apart. And to think when she came back in tears, seeking my pity, asking my forgiveness, seeing her in the mud I pushed her further down, laughing at her; later I wept for her when, on parting, I lived the drama of being alone, with only the voice of my feelings. Tragic dilemma, drama without end, flame that burns with such anguish, such pain, for this love that cries out in agony hour after hour... more, still more. Nights and more nights without dying, I feel nothing but a terrible anguish, and nothing more. |
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