Nobody cries for the rock turned into a statue. There is no one to mourn the statue, on its patient way to dust… I want to praise the scar. You shall know them by their scars. * * * Никой не плаче за камъка, превръщан в статуя. Няма кой да оплаче статуята, по търпеливия път към прахта… […]
Translation
True Confessions by Steve Davenport (German translation by Änne Troester, Spanish translation by Octavio Quintanilla)
1 The ball fields under the old bridge are lit, the fences are short, and the river stinks some nights like dead fish and men sweating after work and cigarettes, beer and piss. Here the catcher squats, toad in a jersey. I’m on deck and there’s this married woman. I’m counting the syllables of a […]
Tana by Irene Jiménez (translated from Spanish by Catherine Nelson)
“I’ve been so committed to the fight for the homosexual cause,” Benjamin explained introspectively, “that I forgot to love.” Ursula, Tana, and Miguel sipped the soup in their spoons and then returned the utensils to their bowls. They looked at Benjamin with understanding smiles. No one had commented on the fact that he had come […]
Brimstone Butterfly in April by Eduard Mörike (translated by Maggie Roseneau)
Cruel sun of springtime, your waking is impetuous, Only in the joy of May thrives tender fare of mine! There is no dear young girl who, from her rosy lip, offers me a honey drip, so miserably I wane and May will never see me in my yellow dress. Citronenfalter im April Grausame Frühlingssonne, du […]
Carnival by Marcel Lecomte (translated by K.A. Wisniewski)
Holà this evening my comrades my good comrades my cow-boys my Sioux my Chinese my Apaches the streets the streets of the big city vibrating with the hum from turns and motors and thousands of wheels that spin at the same time on the soft streets that shines like polished ice the streets I tell […]
Untitled #2 by Aleksey Porvin (translated by Peter Golub)
A childhood memory of a summer day engraves the cough drop with untired saliva, and brings out a phrase, sweetly puckering the mouth— if it sounds, hear not a question, but an encompassing intrigue: what is this lachrymose animal who lives under the creak of the swing? Who—without fear—taught this creature, which uses silence to rub […]
Untitled #1 by Aleksey Porvin (translated by Peter Golub)
The boxy tube of knocking wheels is squeezed by the speed and leaks a long odorous drop of train— glues the clatter onto the horizon; why the craftwork, is there not enough construction visible? For instance: the flat fog, tied by the powerlines to the forest posts or the anticipating – that railroad pointer directing […]
Under the Linden Trees by Alejandro Méndez (translated by Laura Chalar)
She showed me the cemetery’s letter, vehemently shaking the paper. Their earthly stay expired, your bones must be picked up. She had secured the plot of land with a row of linden trees, not imagining what we were about to enact, your new unburied capacity. The house was freezing, a single lamp turned on. Impatience […]
Gift for Languages by Alejandro Méndez (translated by Laura Chalar)
On his motorcycle, far from the Prague of his birth, Mateo knows strength comes from speed. To be one with the machine, in a straight line, even in bends. Aerodynamic device, body at the service of wind. Only a calculation error, the wrong acceleration in a blowout, leads to collision. After the crash, he stands […]
PARADE by Robert Walser (translated by Daniele Pantano)
Flawed elements naturally asserted themselves again this time; I’m thinking of important behavior, incidentally, I’m not going to use rhyme in this poem, so as not to make it sound playful, and because today I want to turn poetry into a children’s game, o, I saw the founder of a publishing house coming up rosy […]
