Among the songs I remember learning early and hearing often on the dance floor, this 1943 tango “Adiós, te vas” fills up the background of the milongas alongside so many others, and yet it stands out purely by its excellence. The melody lumbers out, bearing the weight of a certain restrained emotion, and then develops into something hopelessly wistful. The tune and the text, as I can now appreciate, perfectly express the tension in every goodbye—a conflicted experience of accepting loss while holding on to memory.
The lyrics by Cátulo Castillo center on the image of a train, a symbol of transience common to both popular music and movies of the 1940s. In this song, it becomes almost entirely metaphorical, as he envisions its impersonal journey receding into the unreal world of memory and imagination. The second stanza (as usual, unsung in dance arrangements) adds some sententious lines which, as often occurs in the tango, seem to belong to poetry’s literary traditions more than to those of popular song.
Goodbye, You’re Off
(Tr. Jake Spatz)
YouTube: Roberto Rufino (orq. Carlos Di Sarli)
Now that you’re going home, your whistle and the winter
In whispered voices hearken back to yesterday…
I’ll keep a lantern lit for you as I remember,
And from the platform till the end I’ll call your name.
Here is your stop!… Drink of this tender cup in gladness,
Between your absence and my madness, runs the train…
Runs the train from the station
On its old circulation,
On the far side of woe,
On the far side of love,
Out beyond destination…
Runs the train from the station
On its long circulation,
And in a far dream of yearning
In my hands you’re returning
On the platform again.
Perhaps it ends the same way really, one supposes,
But there’s a sadness in all things I just can’t place.
The rains of yesterday can bring us no more roses,
The skies of yesterday can give us no more faith.
Goodbye!… you’re off!… Leaving me the shake you gave me,
A handkerchief’s farewell you waved me from the train.
Adiós, te vas (1943)
Music: Edigio Pittaluga
Lyrics: Cátulo Castillo
Hoy que regresas, tu silbato y el invierno
Llama con voces sigilosas al ayer,
Tendré encendida la luz de tu recuerdo
Y desde el último andén te llamaré.
¡Bájate aquí!... Bebe esta copa de ternura
Que entre tu ausencia y mi locura corre el tren.
Corre el tren peregrino
Por el viejo camino,
Más allá del dolor,
Más allá de tu amor,
Más allá del destino.
Corre el tren peregrino
Por el largo camino,
Y en un sueño lejano
Vendrás a mi mano
Llenando el andén.
Será lo mismo, puede ser, pero en las cosas
Hay una triste sensación de no sé qué.
Las mismas lluvias de ayer, no dan más rosas,
Los mismos cielos de ayer, no dan más fe.
¡Adiós... te vas!... Queda el saludo del pañuelo
Con que agitabas tu desvelo, desde el trén.