MILONGA DE MIS AMORES

"No one understood better the sentiments and the sorrows of my neighborhood... Even so, they forgot you, and in the alleyway only a guitar remembers... creole like you. And in its moaning it shakes me to the core."

Milonga de mis amores (My beloved milonga) 
Music: Pedro Laurenz
Lyrics: José María Contursi (as a child, right) 
English-language version Copyright © 2014 by Tango Decoder 

Song data at tango.info.

Listen: Charlo • Pedro Laurenz/Farrell • Juan D'Arienzo • Francisco Canaro

Oigo tu voz... Engarzada en los acordes de una lírica guitarra, Sos milonga de otros tiempos... yo te vi crecer Prendida en las polleras de un bailongo guapo y rompedor Como jamás ha de volver. Nadie tal vez... Comprendió mejor las penas y el sentir de mi barriada, Sin embargo te olvidaron y en el callejón Tan sólo una guitarra te recuerda... criolla como vos Y en su gemir tiembla mi ser. Vuelvo cansado de todo Y en mi corazón, lloran los años, Mi vida busca tan sólo La tranquilidad, del viejo barrio. Y encuentro todo cambiado, menos tu canción Milonga mía... El progreso ha destrozado Toda la emoción de mi arrabal. Quiero olvidar... Y tus notas van llenando, de tristeza el alma mía, He cruzado tantas veces ese callejón Llevando entre los labios un silbido alegre y tu cantar Emborrachando el corazón. Era feliz... Entregado a las caricias de la única sincera, Que acunó una primavera que no floreció Milonga... ya no puedo continuar, el llanto me venció ¡Quiero olvidar... y pienso más...!

I hear your voice set to the chords of a dreamy guitar... You are the milonga of another time... I saw you grow, caught up in the swinging skirts of a cracking good barrio dance party* like we'll never see again. No one, perhaps, understood better the sentiments and the sorrows of my neighborhood...  Even so they forgot you and in the alleyway, only a guitar remembers... creole like you. And in its moaning it shakes me to the core. I return tired of it all, and in my heart the years weep. My life seeks only the tranquility of the old neighborhood. And I find everything changed except your song, my milonga... Progress has destroyed the feeling of my arrabal. I want to forget, and your notes keep filling my heart with sadness... I have crossed this alleyway so many times, bearing a happy whistle on my lips, your song intoxicating my heart. I was happy, surrendered to the caresses of the only pure one, who rocked in her arms a primrose that didn’t flower*  Milonga, I can’t go on any longer... weeping overcame me... I want to forget... and I can't stop thinking...

NOTES:

* lyrical guitar: una guitarra lírica. Lírica means lyric or lyrical. Secondary meanings include soñador, dreamy, and utopian or fantastic. Perhaps a guitar whose sound recalls the "milonga of yore" would have a dreamy sound. (Revised 17/7/14)

* cracking good barrio dance party: un bailongo guapo y rompedor. The bailongos were community dance parties often attended by both creoles (Argentines of Spanish descent, later all Europeans) and blacks. It was a melting pot for the transculturation of music and dance that gave rise to the milonga and the tango in the late 19th century. The phrase guapo y rompedor is a slang expression signifying something that is guapo, admirable or of high quality, and rompedor, "breaker," perhaps equivalent to the English expressing "cracking good."

* who cradled in her arms a primrose that did not bloom: The primrose is a symbol of purity. The image suggests a girl who never came to womanhood.