Widows Of The Living And The Dead

Some years ago my good lady, Revoltina, visited a friend in Andalusia. There was a distinct shortage of men in town.  There are many places in this world where the men folk have left to find work.
In this poem Rosalia de Castro describes a similar situation in nineteenth century Galicia. Like Galicia herself, the Peasant Woman is left without a man to work for her, without a man to serve her. 


Este vaise  y aquel vaise
E todos, todos se van,
Galicia, sin homes quedas
Que te poidan traballar.
Tés en cambio orfos e orfas
E campos de soledad.
E nais que non teñen fillos
E fillos que non tén pais
E tés corazóns que sufren
Longas ausencias mortás
Viudas de vivos e mortos
Que ninguén consolará.

This one goes and that one goes,
All of them, all of them go.
Galicia, you are left without men
Who can work you.
Instead you are left with
Orphans and lonely fields.
And mothers without sons,
And sons without fathers
And hearts that suffer 
The long dead absences,
Widows of the living and the dead
That no one can console.