Juan Jacob Apr 13, 2018:

@Robert: ¿Así... ...o me regreso?
Saludos y gracias.

Robert Carter Apr 13, 2018:

@Juan Thanks, but poetry is not my language either :-)
I just think your idea is spot on, so it'd be nice if you were to at least post something along the line of what you wrote here as an answer or reference, to acknowledge your contribution. Saludos!

Juan Jacob Apr 13, 2018:

@Robert. Gracias. No, el inglés no es mi idioma. Tú, adelante.

Robert Carter Apr 13, 2018:

Juan's idea... ...definitely makes the most sense to me. If you look up images of Tehuana earrings, many of them are gold, or at least in colour. Nice one, Juan, please post an answer! How about something like "with earrings the color of cold beer"?

Granted, poetry is not my field, and "earrings as cold as beer" does little in the way of evoking anything resembling a real image or feeling for me, but “Tehuana women with bottle openers for cold beer” just seems absurd - even if you were to translate "aretes" as bottle openers, it couldn't mean "bottle openers for cold beer", syntactically it would have to mean "with bottle openers as cold as beer" or "with the coldness of beer in the bottle openers", which is not the same thing at all.

Thomas Walker Apr 12, 2018:

@Cecilia I'm with you, Cecilia. I understand that it's a poem, & I had read the entire poem before I made my comment on your answer. I do have an imagination, & I do use it. I understand what, for example, "a heart of gold" means, or "he's the black sheep of the family", etc. I'm just saying that "earrings [or for that matter bottle-openers] as cold as beer" just doesn't convey any particular meaning to me. Any help to overcome this will be appreciated.

Cecilia Gowar Apr 12, 2018:

@asker Of course one assumes you have the complete version of whatever you are translating. I mentioned the link to the poem to Tom, so I do not understand why you tell me: "I didn't need to read what Phil published. I have the complete text. His submission is only a portion of the poem."

Cecilia Gowar Apr 12, 2018:

Regarding Pharris notes to my answer I had not realised the link published by Phil was not the complete poem, because I had found it and read it before. Here it is: http://diarioinca.com/poema-antojo-de-trampa-francisco-herna...
Having said that, “Antojo de Trampa” is the name of the book, and the part published by Phil is considered a self contained poem:
http://amediavoz.com/hernandezF.htm#A ESTAS PALABRAS MENUDAS...
Without being an expert on this poet it this seems to me he is writing about love and sensuality, not a particularly trying relationship. In any case, his poetry is not easy to translate. As for the meaning of aretes, it would be interesting if you quoted your sources but I never knew it meant "bottle openers" and could not find any proof of that. Perhaps Juan, being Mexican, could shed some light on this particular issue. In any case, I would never interpret “aretes” as “bottle openers” in this context. Earrings are quite a meaningful part of tehuana women’s attire and an alluring accesory. Much more related to the general imagery than a bottle opener I’d say.

Juan Jacob Apr 11, 2018:

Cold... ...gold, beer (same color!)
El oro es frío, la cerveza igual, mismo color.
Como dice philgoddard, es poesía. Difícil.

philgoddard Apr 11, 2018:

Tom Walker This is poetry! You have to use your imagination! :-)