Tropes

Inside the room, of course, there was one bed.

Not even king, or queen, or full, but twin;

Each in her silence left concern unsaid

'Til one shrugged gently. "If you're in, I'm in."

The other nodded. "The sofa is too small

And won't fold out. The floor is not an option."

Though both agreed, they still began to stall

The moment of the premise's adoption.

One read her book, crammed in a little chair;

One puttered in the bathroom for a while

Pretending she just had to fix her hair

As if she'd ever cared about its style.

But nighttime still did come, and with it sleep;

The two awoke entangled in one heap.

3/30/23

Donald Trump's indictment has arrived

A day much longed for, and as much delayed;

While some are grateful to have now survived

To see it happen, others are dismayed.

I have my side, and I believe it true;

I must acknowledge others too exist;

And while I needn't treat it as they do

I cannot fail to know that they are pissed

And that brings danger. Danger that they will

In homage to a man I know a liar

Take to the streets in search of any ill

That may add fuel to his now desperate fire.

The day, although at long, long last achieved

Does not bring the elation once believed.

The death of a groundhog

The child may believe the warming air

Has promised spring two months before its date

Adulthood brings a plaintive worry there

That questions what it means about our fate.

A warm spring day in February finds

For those who can enjoy it, warmth and cheer;

The rest of us, with nasty little minds

Look on our thermometers with fear.

Perhaps I should embrace the child's wonder

Which lives but in the moment of the sun

And does not fear the danger of the thunder

That comes when this brief warming time is done

But I cannot; the most that I can do

Is let her hope, not raise my own anew.

First Snow

There's something sweet set in the early snow

Before the slush can burden every street

With ground unfrozen and unhurried feet

I watch the snowflakes flutter to and fro

While I with no important place to go

And yet no reason either to retreat

Wander myself more widely still to meet

More snowflakes in the street lights starting glow.

I know of course that I will soon regret

That I live where it snows all winter long

And that the feet that I have quickly set

Out wandering will soon wish they'd belong

To someone sensible and warm. And yet

I cannot think my first response was wrong.

cringe

It's hard to write a love song that's OK;

So many problematic lyrics lie

Lurking to slip in along the way

And turn it creepy. Ask the reason why

Your love is not returned, and you risk seeming

As if you felt entitled to their feeling;

Express your depth and density of dreaming

And see yourself project on them; appealing

To all you've done for them implies a debt

Which is not how love works, or ought to work;

And goodness help you if you've barely met

You're just obsessed, and that makes you a jerk.

Love is a risk, and part of that's the chance

You'll fall to cringe when you attempt romance.

eh

I have no energy for anything

Not for my food, my body, or my feet.

I barely feel the motion of my seat

As I away back and forth. I cannot sing.

I lack even the anger I would bring

To feeling sick. I only feel defeat.

I have no strength to rouse myself or greet

The day. I'm strung up in a string

Of my own emptiness. It numbs the pain

So that I barely register it anymore,

But do not truly feel any relief.

I want to sleep. My eyelids will not wane

Which makes me almost wonder what they're for

But wondering is work beyond belief.

Rain, Fair

There's some divine displeasure in the day

That drips down raindrops on the milling crowd,

Turns calm white clouds into a whirling gray

(As if the summer's sky were disallowed),

Spills sodden seeds down onto city streets

That were not well-designed to take the load,

And when all this is done, simply repeats

Washing along all those who dared the road.

God does not dice with us; we are not players

But pieces moved around the board at need.

There is no hope for answer to our prayers:

Our wills are ours, but divine will is freed

To soak the city down at divine pleasure

Regardless of our hopeful plans for leisure.

Further on Translation

I have been working and reworking on some translations from Lope de Vega's "Rimas", and it has made me think about the nature of translating something like a sonnet in slightly more structured terms than I have previously; or possibly just in slightly different terms than I have previously, given the previous posts on this blog about this topic.

In short, I want to suggest that while there is definitely value in translating formal poetry like a sonnet into a) the most euphonious translation regardless of meter and rhyme in the new language, b) a poetic translation that nevertheless takes liberties with both rhyme and meter in order to once again deliver a more aesthetically pleasing result, or c) an extremely literal translation, I will always plump for d) a sonnet translated as a sonnet.

Now of course some of this is my personal commitment to the sonnet form, with all its ridiculousnesses. But I want to suggest that the meter and rhyme are just as fundamental to the sonnet as the words themselves.

After all as I suggested repeatedly here, a sonnet is not a sonnet without that structure; it is still obviously a poem, if it wants to be, and it can even be a formal poem without the specific metrical and rhythmic and rhyming structures of the 14 line metered rhyming sonnet, but I believe that in responding to the form and participating in the form and being a sonnet there is still distinct value to retaining those formal elements.

As such of course one must accept some degree of alteration to other elements of the poem. The question is which? After all just as I have said that the sonnet has formal elements that should be respected, each poem obviously has all the other elements such as language and specific word choice and theme and metaphor and wordplay etc. Why respect the sonnet form over those?

Well of course the first answer is that as much as possible we should retain all of it. I think translations are at their best when they can participate in multiple layers of what the original was doing, and so keeping the rhyme and meter while also keeping the meaning and the subtext and so on is the ideal. But I am sympathetic to the idea that the poem should and does have some wiggle room. The repositioning of a term; the insertion or deletion of a small phrase that seems to have unity with the rest of the poem, but is either not going to fit into the new language or is required to make up the rhyme or meter; the use of synonyms that do not specifically meet cognates for instance; these and other related techniques that attempt to maintain what the translator feels are the essential core elements of the sonnet while assisting in producing the formal elements of the sonnet are, I think, justified.

Practically, this usually means a very rough translation, followed by an attempt at a smoother more metrical and rhythmic and rhyming translation, followed by an awful lot of tinkering.

But I believe that doing so is helpful to maintain the sonnet-ness of the poem, and to help a new reader in a new language understand that this poem too was participating in that deep tradition.

Mutuals

Forgive me, for I must admit my lack:

I do not have the patience. Not for this.

I'd love if you would only cut me slack

And cover what impatience makes me miss.

Oh, do not blame the phone! It did not force

My fingers to caress it, or my eyes

To dance over its surface. Yes, of course,

I was distracted, but the fault here lies

With me, not my distraction. I cannot

As I should, let my mind be settled here

But must explore my every waking thought

Online. And so I beg of you my dear

Forgive my fault, and try, love, to recall

You do the same too often after all.

John Leslie Breck (Exhibition at Figge)

There are some themes I can identify:

The grainstacks of Giverny, first of all,

Set in the open, backed by bluish sky;

The seasons, though not ever fully fall;

The open river, lined by leaning trees

That yearn to touch the water, but cannot,

Their limbs untouched by even mild breeze,

Their trunks too stable to imagine rot;

Beck in himself, a not-too-humble scene;

A dozen or so snowfalls, white with grey;

Most everything in blues and deeper green

Touched by the tendrils of the dawning day;

Most livelily, another painter's daughters

And drops of sunlight on the endless waters.