Lorca's poem: "The Ship, Solid and Black" (translated by Robert Bly):
The ship, solid and black / entered the clear blackness / of the great harbor. Quiet and cold -- / the people waiting / are still asleep, dreaming, / and warm, far away and still stretched out in this dream perhaps . . . / How real our watch is, beside the dream / of doubt the others had! How sure it is, compared / to their troubled dream about us! / Quiet Silence. / Silence which is breaking up at dawn / will speak differently.
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Commentary: Lorca is talking about people of vision, people of the Big dream, entering the black harbor right before the dawn in their black ship. These visionaries / big dreamers have been voyaging for answers on the open sea on their sea-worthy ship. Meanwhile the villagers, who are still sleeping, shrouded in "the dream of doubt", are still "far away", even though they are warm, stretched out in their beds, they are far from each other, far away from reality. In their dreams of doubt "we" are still at sea, lost at sea, gone to them, possibly not even alive to them! But when dawn breaks they will look out into the harbor and see (with the sleep still in their eyes) that we are back. We have returned with stories of hope and visions to help them continue to live their lives. At dawn, according to this poem, the silence of doubt will end.
Bob Dylan read Lorca and might have been familiar with this poem. In fact this poem might have influenced Dylan's writing: "When the Ship Comes In".
A song will liftAs the mainsail shiftsAnd the boat drifts on to the shorelineAnd the sun will respectEvery face on the deckThe hour that the ship comes in
Then the sands will rollOut a carpet of goldFor your weary toes to be a-touchin'And the ship's wise menWill remind you once againThat the whole wide world is watchin'
Commentary: Though his perspective shifts, Dylan's song includes the perspective of one who has been voyaging on this ship of vision. In Lorca's poem the arrival of the ship is quiet, even mysterious. The village of the harbor is still asleep but curiously, it is the silence that will be "breaking up at dawn" to be replaced by new words. The language of doubt will be replaced by a new kind of language. Lorca leaves the rest up to our imagination.
In Dylan's ballad, the ship is riding in on the waves of the coming "hurricane".
"And the seas will split / And the ship will hit / And the sands on the shoreline will be shaking / The the tide will sound / And the waves will pound / And the morning will be breaking . . ."
Both poems are describing an archetypal event whose hour has come, a momentous and numinous event. Archetypes come from a deep place in the psyche and are shared, so it is just as likely that Dylan's lyrics were not influenced by Lorca's poem. I find both inspiring.
Almost every other day now, I feel that the ship is coming in and the dawn is breaking.
(Article changed on Jul 17, 2023 at 10:38 AM EDT)
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