A Simple New Year's Resolution...

Commit a poem to memory.

'Twas the Night Before Christmas

'Twas the Night Before Christmas

by Clement Clark Moore

Twas the night before Christmas, when all through the house
Not a creature was stirring, not even a mouse.
The stockings were hung by the chimney with care,
In hopes that St Nicholas soon would be there.

The children were nestled all snug in their beds,
While visions of sugar-plums danced in their heads.
And mamma in her ‘kerchief, and I in my cap,
Had just settled our brains for a long winter’s nap.

When out on the lawn there arose such a clatter,
I sprang from the bed to see what was the matter.
Away to the window I flew like a flash,
Tore open the shutters and threw up the sash.

The moon on the breast of the new-fallen snow
Gave the lustre of mid-day to objects below.
When, what to my wondering eyes should appear,
But a miniature sleigh, and eight tinny reindeer.

With a little old driver, so lively and quick,
I knew in a moment it must be St Nick.
More rapid than eagles his coursers they came,
And he whistled, and shouted, and called them by name!

"Now Dasher! now, Dancer! now, Prancer and Vixen!
On, Comet! On, Cupid! on, on Donner and Blitzen!
To the top of the porch! to the top of the wall!
Now dash away! Dash away! Dash away all!"

As dry leaves that before the wild hurricane fly,
When they meet with an obstacle, mount to the sky.
So up to the house-top the coursers they flew,
With the sleigh full of Toys, and St Nicholas too.

And then, in a twinkling, I heard on the roof
The prancing and pawing of each little hoof.
As I drew in my head, and was turning around,
Down the chimney St Nicholas came with a bound.

He was dressed all in fur, from his head to his foot,
And his clothes were all tarnished with ashes and soot.
A bundle of Toys he had flung on his back,
And he looked like a peddler, just opening his pack.

His eyes-how they twinkled! his dimples how merry!
His cheeks were like roses, his nose like a cherry!
His droll little mouth was drawn up like a bow,
And the beard of his chin was as white as the snow.

The stump of a pipe he held tight in his teeth,
And the smoke it encircled his head like a wreath.
He had a broad face and a little round belly,
That shook when he laughed, like a bowlful of jelly!

He was chubby and plump, a right jolly old elf,
And I laughed when I saw him, in spite of myself!
A wink of his eye and a twist of his head,
Soon gave me to know I had nothing to dread.

He spoke not a word, but went straight to his work,
And filled all the stockings, then turned with a jerk.
And laying his finger aside of his nose,
And giving a nod, up the chimney he rose!

He sprang to his sleigh, to his team gave a whistle,
And away they all flew like the down of a thistle.
But I heard him exclaim, ‘ere he drove out of sight,
"Happy Christmas to all, and to all a good-night!"

Primo Levi Translations.

Continuing with the theme of translation, today I share the work of another friend, Jenna Weiner, and the translations she has worked on by Primo Levi.  Her own words introduce her work better than I ever could and her prose following the poem offers sharp insight into the process and challenges of translation.

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As my final project, I chose to translate some poems by Primo Levi. Aside from being attracted to the original language of his poems (I am an Italian minor, after all), I was compelled by his experience in Auschwitz and the powerful role of bearing witness in his life and his works. While watching the documentary film about him, I was particularly struck by the urgency with which he wrote “Se Questo è un Uomo” (“If This is a Man”) upon returning from Auschwitz. A friend of his interviewed in the documentary said that Levi spoke for days and days after his return, explaining to his friends and family that he had been waiting for so long to tell everyone what he experienced. After he finished talking, he sat down to write “Se Questo è un Uomo.”

Although I am not translating that book, I can see the same sentiment carry over into his other works. I found his poems to be simple yet powerful—the language of someone who wants you to sit down and hear his incredible story. Discussing love, life, suffering, his specific experiences and the concept of bearing witness, all of Levi’s poems are marked by a kind of questioning for meaning or answers, either directly or implicitly. Searching within himself, society, the external world and God, his poems are extremely powerful and perceptive.

Regarding the classic dilemma of translating — the question of whether to make the translated poem the priority or to make the faithful translation a priority — I chose the latter. I was struck by the simplicity and effectiveness of Levi’s words, and I believe that he made the choices he did for a reason, so I tried to honor his choices as much as possible.

I have accompanied my translations with the original poem and the translations by Ruth Feldman and Brian Swann, for comparison. I have also followed the first two poems with explanations of the decisions I made while translating, to give you a sense of my thought process. It is safe to say that I continued translating the rest of the poems in the same way.

Cantare

by Primo Levi

… Ma quando poi cominciammo a cantare
Le buone nostre canzoni insensate
Allora avvenne che tutte le cose
Furono ancora com’erano state.

Un giorno non fu che un giorno:
Sette fanno una settimana
Cosa cattiva ci parve uccidere;
Morire, una cosa lontana

E i mesi passano piuttosto rapidi,
Ma davanti ne abbiamo tanti!
Fummo di nuovo soltanto giovani:
Non martiri, non infami, non santi.

Questo ed altro ci veniva in mente
Mentre continuavamo a cantare;
Ma erano cose come le nuvole,
E difficili da spiegare.

3 gennaio 1946

Singing 

translated by Jenna Weiner

... But then when we started to sing
Our beautiful senseless songs
It just so happened that everything
Was still like it always had been.

A day was nothing more than a day:
Seven make a week
Killing seemed evil to us;
Dying, something distant.

And the months pass rather quickly,
But there are still so many left!
We were again only young men:
Not martyrs, not infamous, not saints.

This and other things used to come to mind
While we kept singing;
But they were like the clouds,
And difficult to explain.

3 January 1946

Singing 

translation by Feldman and Swann

… But then when we started singing
Those good foolish songs of ours,
Then everything was again
As it always had been.

A day was just a day,
And seven make a week.
Killing seemed an evil thing to us;
Dying – something remote.

The months pass rather quickly,
But there are still so many left!
Once more we were just young men:
Not martyrs, not infamous, not saints.

This and other things came into our minds
While we kept singing.
But they were cloudlike things,
Hard to explain.

3 January 1946

In the first line, I used “sing” instead of the “singing” that Feldman and Swann used (the infinitive can be translated either way), because I thought it sounded better with “songs” in the next line. In the second line, I used “senseless” instead of Feldman and Swann’s “foolish,” because that’s literally what insensate means, and I thought it had a nice alliteration with “songs.” “Buone” can mean either good or beautiful (which speaks to the Italian culture), and I thought “beautiful senseless” had a nicer sound than “good foolish.” “Then everything” loses the “avvenne” in the Italian, which means “to happen,” so I thought a nice balance was “It just so happened that everything.” (It literally translates to “it happened that everything,” but I wanted a longer sentence to balance the rhythm.) I do not agree with Feldman and Swann’s decision to change the line break from the original (which translates to “everything / was”); I think it stands just fine as is.

In the first line of the second stanza, I stayed true to the original poem, which translates to “a day was not but a day.” I think that structure is more powerful than Feldman and Swann’s “a day was just a day.” In the next line, I stayed true to the original and did not add “And” as F&S did. In the last line of the stanza, I translated “lontana” as “distant” rather than “remote” because it has alliteration with “dying.” I did not think the change from the comma to the dash (as seen in F&S) was necessary.

In the next stanza, I kept the “and” at the beginning of the line, because clearly Levi put it there for a reason. I used “again” instead of “once more,” because it has nice internal rhyme with “men.”

In the next stanza I used “used to come to mind” to convey the imperfect verb tense (which suggests a continued or often-repeated action) of “to come;” something that “came” does not reflect. I did not see the need to turn the simple analogy of “they were things like clouds” (which is the original translation) into “cloudlike things.” I stayed with the literal translation of “difficult,” because I thought it balanced out the line length better than “hard” did.

Unfortunately, I was not able to preserve the rhyme of the original poem, which was really beautiful in the Italian.

Love America

A friend of mine, Mikaela Dunitz, worked on new translations of thirteen poems from Pablo Neruda's General Song.  I want to share them all, but will do so sporadically so as to prevent my readers from becoming too overwhelmed! 

Below is the poem in Neruda's Spanish followed by Mikaela's English translation.

Amor América
by Pablo Neruda

Antes de la peluca y la casaca
fueron los ríos, ríos arteriales,
fueron las cordilleras, en cuya onda raída
el cóndor o la nieve parecían inmóviles:
fue la humedad y la espesura, el trueno
sin nombre todavía, las pampas planetarias.
El hombre tierra fue, vasija, parpado
del barro trémulo, forma de la arcilla,
fue cántaro caribe, piedra chibcha,
copa imperial o sílice araucana.
Tierno y sangriento fue, pero en la empuñadura
de su arma de cristal humedecido,
las iniciales de la tierra estaban escritas.
Nadie pudo recordarlas después: el viento
las olvido, el idioma del agua
fue enterrado, las claves se perdieron
o se inundaron de silencio o sangre.

No se perdió la vida, hermanos pastorales.
Pero como una rosa salvaje
cayo una gota roja en la espesura
y se apago una lámpara de tierra.
Yo estoy aquí para contar la historia.
Desde la paz del bufalo
hasta las azotadas arenas
de la tierra final, en las espumas
acumuladas de la luz antártica,
y por las madrigueras despeñadas
de la sombría paz venezolana,
te busque, padre mío,
joven guerrero de tiniebla y cobre
o tu, planta nupcial, cabellera indomable,
madre caimán, metálica paloma.

Yo, incásico del légamo,
toque la piedra y dije:
Quien me espera? Y apreté la mano
sobre un puñado de cristal vacío.
Pero anduve entre flores zapotecas
y dulce era la luz como un venado,
y era la sombra como un parpado verde.
Tierra mía sin nombre, sin América,
estambre equinoccial, lanza de púrpura,
tu aroma me trepo por las raíces
hasta la copa que bebía, hasta la más delgada
palabra aun no nacida de mi boca.


Love America
by Mikaela Dunitz

Love America (1400) (164)

Before the wig and coat
were the rivers, the arterial rivers,
the mountain ranges, in whose weary wave
the condor or the snow appeared unstirring:
the thickness of the humidity, the unnamed
thunderclap, the planetary pampas.

Man was earth, a vessel, the eyelid
of the quivering clay, a form from the mud of the earth,
a Carib pitcher, a chibcha stone,
an imperial chalice or an Araucanian silica.
Tender and bleeding he was, but on the hilt
of his moist crystal weapon,
the initials of the earth were
inscribed.
No one
could remember them later: the wind
forgot them, the language of the water
interred, the keys were lost
or inundated by silence or blood.

Life was not lost, pastoral brothers.
But as a savage rose,
a red drop fell to the depths,
and the lamp of the land was extinguished.
I am here to tell history.
Since the peace of the buffalo
until the lashed sands
of final earth, in the accumulated surf
of antarctic light,
and for the burrows embedded off the cliffs
of somber Venezuelan peace,
I searched for you, my father,
young soldier of shadows and brass,
or you, nuptial plant, indomitable hair,
caiman mother, metallic dove.

I, Inca from mud,
touched the stone and said:
Who
waits for me? And I squeezed my hand
around a fistful of empty glass.
But I traveled among zapotec flowers
and the light was as gentle as a stag,
and the shade was like a green eyelid.

My earth without a name, without America,
equinoctial stamen, purple spear,
your aroma winds up my roots
into the chalice I nursed, into the finest
word still not yet born from my mouth.

Terza Rima

Terza Rima 

by Richard Wilbur

In this great form, as Dante proved in Hell,
There is no dreadful thing that can’t be said
In passing. Here, for instance, one could tell

How our jeep skidded sideways toward the dead
Enemy soldier with the staring eyes,
Bumping a little as it struck his head,

And then flew on, as if toward Paradise.

From The New Yorker.

A few years ago I had a lot of fun experimenting with various form poems -- pantoums and sestinas -- but, began to question the utility of form poetry compared to free verse.  This poem restores some of my confidence in form poetry.

Terza rima is a three-line stanza using chain rhyme in the pattern a-b-a, b-c-b, c-d-c, etc.  Poems written in terza rima end with either a single line or couplet repeating the rhyme of the middle line of the final tercet.

I like Wilbur's poem because:

a) It is self-referential and profoundly aware of its form -- in its title, opening line, and allusion to the work of Dante (famous for his use of terza rima in the Divine Comedy).  

b) Its play with fact and fiction in the last tercet reminds me of Tim O'Brien's "How to Tell a True War Story".  What is important is that the jeep could skid and run over a soldier, not whether it actually happened.  As long as there is an audience that expects war stories, narratives of war must be created, told, and retold; and, reality will extend to the limits we are willing to accept as fiction.

Polar Bear Poetry

A group of Seattle poets and poetry enthusiasts read poetry on the shore of Green Lake before plunging in for a frigid swim.  The event's organizer, "Mimi" Allin said, she wants to make poetry fun, get in the news, wake people and bring together rival camps of "page poets and stage poets."  

While mildly entertaining, and certainly a rush for all involved I'm skeptical of the effectiveness of such "guerilla" art.  

Poetry Responds to Climate Change

350 is an environmental action organization dedicated to increasing awareness about global warming and climate change.  350 parts per million is the level of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere that must be reached to prevent huge and irreversible damage to the earth; 350's mission is to spur policy and grassroots action to reduce carbon dioxide levels.  350 calls the global community to action while promoting education and awareness about climate change.  

350 has incorporated Yu Kwang-Chung's poetry into their awareness campaign.  Below he reads his poem, "Aunt Ice, Aunt Snow".  

Aunt Ice, Aunt Snow
in memory of two beauties in the Water family

by Yu Kwang-Chung

Aunt Ice, please cry no more
Or the seas will spill all over,
And homeless will be the polar bear,
And harbors will be flooded,
And islands will go under.
Cry no more please, Aunt Ice.

We blamed you for being so cold,
Fit to behold, but not to hold.
We called you the Icy Beauty,
Mad with self-love on keeping clean,
Too proud ever to become soft.
Yet, when you cry so hard, you melt.

Aunt Snow, please hide no more
Or you will truly disappear.
Almost a stranger year after year,
When you do come, you’re less familiar,
Thinner and gone again sooner.
Please hide no more, Aunt Snow.

You were beloved as the fairest:
With such grace you used to descend,
Even more lightly than Aunt Rain.
Such pure white ballerina shoes
Drift in a whirl out of heaven
Like a nursery song, a dream.

Cry no more please, Aunt Ice.
Lock up your rich treasury,
Shut tight your translucent tower,
And guard your palaces at the poles
To keep the world cool and fresh.
Cry no more please, Aunt Ice.

Hide no more please, Aunt Snow.
“Light Snow is followed by Heavy Snow.”
Descend in avalanche, Aunt Snow!
Your show the Lunar Pageant waits.
Come and kiss my upturned face.
Hide no more please, Aunt Snow.

Yu Kwang-Chung reads "Aunt Ice, Aunt Snow"