#poetry translation

[dervishlatino]

Drink me, burn me, love me (English Translation)

All roads lead to you, even the ones I took to forget you. Because I can deny everything, but not your fragrance when it comes to conquer me. Whoever says you are a crooked creature has not seen your figure, nor your flowing curves. Flowing like a cascade of femininity, and bending me to the edge of insanity. From my eyes, a waterfall, but in my heart, a fire burns. Tell me, do you want a drink or to dance with me in my eternal fire?

✦ @dervishlatino | NNF نشوان نازاريو فيريرا ✦

[tavina-writes]

This is entirely copied from my reblog of this post, but I just thought I'd put this in a post of my own for safekeeping on this hellsite or I'd literally never find the translation of Xingnv's Lament I did for this reblog ever again but. Anyway!

Whenever I think about the fact that like, people claim historical people grieved less about child and infant mortality I want to start biting because here's the translation of the Cao Zhi's poem on losing a daughter (yes the Cao Zhi of the infamous bean poem/Seven Step Quatrain fame) written sometime in the 200s AD: 行女哀辞

序：行女生于季秋，而终于首夏。三年之中，二子频丧。 伊上帝之降命，何修短之难哉；或华发以终年，或怀妊而逢灾。 感前哀之未阕，复新殃之重来！方朝华而晚敷，比晨露而先晞。 感逝者之不追，情忽忽而失度。天盖高而无阶，怀此恨其谁诉！

Xingnv's Lament

Preface: My youngest daughter, Xingnv, was born in late autumn and died in early summer of the following year. In just three years, two beloved daughters died one after another. The heavens grant precious life to people, yet why is the length of that life so hard to guess Some people are fortunate to live to old age, others die young in the womb I have yet to finish grieving for Jinhu*, yet I have to see Xingnv** buried in dust This poor child falls like the hibiscus, life drying like the morning dew I thought of that young life that could never return, and lose my normal composure Resenting that the heavens have no stairs for me to climb, to pour out the sorrows of my heart

*Jinhu is the first child that he mentioned

**Xingnv is the daughter he dedicated this poem to

Like! DESPITE what people will tell you people often grieved their children, yes, even daughters which, historical fiction SO often say that fathers hated having Girl Children or whatever. We only know Cao Jinhu and Cao Xingnv's names because their father wrote them down. And grieved their absence.

"Resenting that the heavens have no stairs for me to climb" is SO bleak and so utterly fucking devastating.

[inkcurlsandknives]

Am I learning baybayin calligraphy to test a book theory for 1 historically accurate throwaway detail in SAINTS OF STORM AND SORROW? 🫣 Maybe?

And maybe I just spent 3 hours collecting banana leaves from a condemned apartment building, finding Tagalog Tanaga poems that fit thematically with my novel, SAINTS OF STORM AND SORROW translating the tagalog into baybayin symbols then testing writing implements and copying out 4 different sheets to be stored in different environments to test the long term legibility of said poems 🤣 that's also possible!

But in my defense nowhere on the internet was willing to tell me more than the Wikipedia single paragraph of yes South East Asia and the Philippines used banana leaves as a writing surface pre-colonization. So really this was for science. I will likely be writing up a full blog post detailing my recent adventure into historical recreation and banana leaves, once I've finished using all my extra banana leaves to make suman 😋

Happy Filipino American History month 🇵🇭

[johbeil]

A poem that never wished to be written

If you asked it – which is absurd – it wouldn’t say anything or bat its eyelashes in wonder Because eyelashes were attributed to it – long, gently curved, like those from a beauty salon – Nicole Weiß (© 2024) Translated from the German original (which can be found here) by Johannes Beilharz.

[michelangelo-daily]

"La Risposta del Buonarroto" (Buonarroti's response) Translation by William Wells Newell (1900) - signed as "I epigram" in this edition "The Night", Sagrestia Nuova (New Sacristy), Medici Chapels, Basilica di San Lorenzo in Florence, Italy. Photo by Paolo Monti, 1975.

This epigram was written by Michelangelo Buonarroti in response to a quartine by Carlo Strozzi (or, according to Vasari, Giovanni Strozzi) in praise of the artist's statue of the Night, situated on the left of the tomb of Giuliano di Lorenzo de' Medici, Duke of Nemours.

The words are "pronunced" by the statue herself, explaining that she's calmer than the other statues (who are decipted as restless) in the chapel beacuse she's sleeping and don't minding the troubles from the real world, imploring the visitors to keep their voice low and let her sleep.

[greygulfh]

True Is That A Deer - Emet Ki Tzevi - אֱמֶת כִּי צְבִי

Desire song by 11th century Sephardic poet Samuel ibn Naghrillah ("Shmuel Hanagid"), translated by greygulfh on Tumblr

True is that a deer gathers lilies from in your gardens - \\ I loved him, so at me you unleash your burning anger,

And if you would have seen the one I love in your own eyes - \\ Than your lovers will search for you but you will be no more.

He spoke: scoop out for me the honey from in your swarm's hive! \\ I answered to him: give me the honey from in your tongue.

And he angered and said to me in ire: would we sin \\ To the living God? I answered to him: I'll pardon you!

Original Hebrew, phonetic transcript and annotation under the cut

Original Hebrew:

אֱמֶת כִּי צְבִי לוֹקֵט וְרָדִים בְּגַנֶּךָ — // אֲהַבְתִּיו, לְכֵן עָלַי תְּשַׁלַּח חֲרוֹנֶךָ,

וְלוּ תֶחֱזֶה, אֶת שֶׁאֲהַבְתִּיו, בְּעֵינֶיךָ — // אֲזַי שִׁחֲרוּךָ אוֹהֲבֶיךָ וְאֵינֶךָ.

אֲשֶׁר שָׂח : רְדֵה נָא לִי דְּבַשׁ מִנְּחִילֶךָ! // עֲנִיתִיו: תְּנָה לִּי אֶת דְּבַשׁ מִלְּשׁוֹנֶךָ.

וְקָצַף וְאָמַר לִי בְּזַעַף: הֲנֵחָטֵא // לְאֵל חַי? עֲנִיתִיו: בִּי, אֲדוֹנִי עֲווֹנֶךָ!

Phonetic Transcript:

Emet ki tzevi loqet veradim be'ganecha - // Ahavtiv, lachen aalai teshalach charonecha

Ve'lu techeze, et she'ahavtiv, be'eineicha - // Azai shicharucha ohaveicha ve'einecha

Asher sach: rede na li devash minchilecha! // Anitiv: tena li et devash mi'leshonecha

Ve'qatzaf ve'amar li be'za'aaf: hanechate // Le'el chai? Aanitiv: bi, adoni aavonecha!

And now, the fun part.

It is unknown when exactly the poem was written, however the author lived in the years 993-1053 in Moorish Iberia. It is written in the style of many Jewish poets of the time, and is scholarly categorized as a "desire song"- a love song.

It does have a few alternate interpretation- some think it an admiration song from a mentor to young man, others see it as a worship-love song to God, some even think it as a song about the love of the promise land (often compared to a deer, "Tzevi Israel")

I find those interpretations stupid. Plain and simple, because the late poet does have songs that discuss all of those topics, and they are not like the one we have here.

What we do have here is a very sensual poem about MLM love. This isn't a translation choice- Hebrew is a gendered language, and it is apparent that all 3 characters are men.

We start with the title: "Emet Ki Ztevi". The "Ztevi"- a male deer, is a metaphor for a lover, and especially one that is young and spry. It comes from a few places in the Bible, but especially from from the Song of Songs: "My beloved is like a gazelle or a young stag. [...]" (2:9). Truthfully "Tzevi" would probably refer to a gazelle, but I'm using the obscurity of ancient taxonomy and this quote to excuse my translation.

"True is that a deer gathers lilies from in your garden - \\ I loved him, so at me you unleash your anger,".

In this verse, the speaker is talking to another man, who is angry with him for his love of the deer. The garden of roses is once again a reference to Song of Songs (and other biblical verses): "My beloved is gone down into his garden [...] to gather lilies." (6:2). It is a metaphor for the body of the speaker.

The other man's anger is expressed with another biblical verse, speaking of the wrath of God: "[...] you threw down those who opposed you. You unleashed your burning anger; it consumed them like stubble." (Exoduse 15:7).

So in other words, the line says: "it is true that a young man has been intimate with me, and I love him, so you are mad at me." The other man, the one who is not the deer or the speaker, is just it- he is a betrayed or a past lover of the speaker, who seems jealous and mad at his new companion. It is also worth mentioning the stark contrast between the divine wrath of Exodus to the sexual nature of Song of Songs- perhaps to emphasize the rivalry between the other man's and the deer.

But the next line is an attempt at appeasement:

"And if you would have seen the one I love in your own eyes \\ Than your lovers will search for you but you will be no more."

"If you would have seen him, you too would fall and forget your loved ones". It is also important to note the reference: "Why do you not pardon my offenses and forgive my sins? For I will soon lie down in the dust, you will search for me, but I will be no more." (Job 7:21) In this verse Job begs for the mercy of God, saying that either way he will soon be gone. This not only compliments the Godlike anger of the other man, but makes his absolution in the face of the admiration for the deer very human and natural.

The speaker then goes to regale a conversation between the deer and himself:

"He spoke: scoop out for me the honey from in your swarm's hive! \\ I answered to him: give me the honey from in your tongue."

The specific word for the scooping of honey is mentioned in Judges 14:9 in relation to Samson. In the chapter he goes to the city of Timnah to meet with a Philistine woman he desires to merry, and while on his way, slays a lion that attacked him with his bare hands. On his way back, he found that a bees have swarmed inside of the lion's carcass. With his bare hands again, he scoops out the honey for him to eat, and later gives some of it to his parents- without ever telling them of the fight with the lion or the origin of the honey.

This gives way to two aspects of the poem; one, the labor of scooping honey against the simplicity of giving a kiss, and second, the feeling of sin.

Samson went to mingle with someone God does not approve of and tells nothing of the journey to his parents, not the good nor the bad. And like Samson, so does the speaker sin. It is another reason I find the alternative interpretations to this poem ridiculous- even as they try to absolve the writer from homosexuality, it's right there, even with its negative social and religious aspects.

And speaking of this:

"And he angered and said to me in ire: would we sin \\ To the living God? I answered to him: I'll pardon you!

The deer is outraged by the speaker's blatentness, but is also genuinely questioning: "WOULD we sin?" ("Ha'nechate", "הנחטא") as both "are we to do this?" and "is it a sin?".

"I'll pardon you!" answers the speaker, referencing Samuel 1 25:14, in which Abigail is trying to take blame for her husband's defiance of king David. It's a calling, one that is glad and determined in the poem.

"The living God" comes from Joshua 3:10, as God speaks to the Israelite through Joshua while the ark of covenant is shown to them: "This is how you will know that the living God is among you [...]". "Among you" is a lacking translation- the Hebrew word, "Be'qirbechem"- "בקרבכם"- also means "in your guts". This part is broken off from the beginning of the verse by a physical break in it and from its end by the question, so it can belong to both or either of the men.

So in plain words, the verse says:

"Would we sin (to the innermost God)?"

"(To the innermost God) I will take your sin as my own and absolve you of it!"

[kom-poetry-channel]

Kipling arrives at the sensible anti-Communist position held by all reasonable men from an odd angle: He's apparently in favour of the Czars. I think it's fair to say that this is now an unusual position even among people who would have backed the White armies as a lesser evil against the Red; considered as a regime, Czarist Russia is not recommended by anything in particular except the quality of what overthrew it. Although it is possible that Kipling sees the February Revolution as installing a legitimate constitutional government - who knows, they might even have come around on the issue of retaining a monarch? - while the October Revolution is the one that destroyed Russia entirely; the phrase "'twixt seeding-time and frost" could reasonably match that timeline. That aside, I think Kipling favours a monarch (and hereditary aristocracy) as a stabilising institution, even with a lot of power in a democratic-ish parliament; poems like "The Old Issue" and "McDonough's Song" suggest that he likes checks and balances and also tends to see the polity he was born into as the best-arranged one, as often happens.

There's no obvious connection between the Christmas carol and the poem; perhaps Kipling simply liked the repeated phrase "God rest ye… gentlemen". This was the bottleneck in the translation; I could find no Norwegian verb corresponding to the archaic English "rest ye merry" (note that it's the rest and not the gentlemen who are merry, although in Kipling's version it's presumably the gentlemen who are peaceful), and "gentlemen" is also a difficult one to render into Norwegian, especially with the scansion constraint. I ended up going from verb to noun, "God rest ye" to "God's rest", and once I had that everything else flowed easily.

The images are propaganda and photographs from the Great War and the Russian Civil War, with an occasional nod to Napoleon and WWII. The thing about Kipling's repeated "what next" is, of course, that with respect to Russia he was perfectly correct, as demonstrated by the repeated appearance of Stalin illustrating a text that cannot well have imagined him. Specific comments:

"God rest you" - four images of victory celebrations; presumably premature ones in Kipling's view.

"…in such a trench" - a mass grave, very trench-shaped, at Katyn.

"…to dig a nation's grave" - "The White Army retreats from Rostov".

"…no shadow, sound, or sight" - "The Burning of Moscow".

"…the shadow of a people" - Stalin's face making the cutting edge of a sickle is absolutely chilling.

"…that perish in the field" - "Fleeing Dekulakization".

"…for such a bribe to yield" - the sickle plowing the field is apparently intended as pro-Communist propaganda, but in context I must say I find it rather the opposite.

"…ashes, blood, and earth" - "Decossackization". The Communists do appear to have had a variety of de-somethingizations; Orwell commented on it.

"…shovel and smooth it all" - burial of the Unknown Soldier.

"…a Nation dead" - the graveyard at Verdun, obviously a large part of the reason why Kipling's desired intervention couldn't happen. "Us and what army?", the peaceful gentlemen might reasonably have responded.

"…your good help to fall?" - Finland and the Ukraine, as it turned out.

Guds hvile, godtfolk! Mor eder, la intet gi besvær - men, hatten av en stakket stund. De døde bæres her. Byer, hærer, utenfor alt av tallkunst eller bry og si meg, godtfolk, hva dere tror det jærtegn kan bety?

Bryt her grunn for en sliten rest som ikke holdt sin grunn. Gi dem den hvile de krever mest… og hvem tar neste blund, godtfolk, i slik en grøft sin blund?

Guds fred nu, godtfolk! Hvil her trygt! Men - slipp oss dog forbi. Et land så stort som England var, skal herved settes bi. For den Trone og den Stolthet og den Ære og den Makt - tre hundre år det varte; og tre hundre dagers slakt!

Olje her til en frossen flokk som ligger i grøft og renne. Varm dem, som aldri fikk varme nok… og hva skal brenne nå, godtfolk, på slikt et bål å brenne?

Guds hvile, godtfolk! La Ham eders nattesøvn vel trygge. Av dette rike gjenstår nå ei stemme, syn, eller skygge. Unntagen de som gråter, og lys av brann og fyr; og skyggen av det folket som trampes ned i myr.

Bryt her brød for en sulten skåk som svelter plent ihjel. Gi dem mat der de tar sitt åk . . . og hvem skal gi etter nå, godtfolk, i bytte for slikt et mel?

Guds hvile, godtfolk, Han være deres munterhet et skjold! Hva kongedømme falt så raskt til aske, blod og mold? Mellom sommer og snefall, frosten kommet knapt - våpen og verge, råd og håp, navn og rike tapt!

Slipp ned, slipp ned ved hode og fot - spa jord, og jevn ut alt! Slik begraves nasjoners mot . . . og hvem skal imorgen ha falt, godtfolk, med deres hjelp ha falt?

[beinahr]

Anna Akhmatova (tr. by Lau Beinahr)

[summerscaries]

Ja visst gör det ont // Yes, of course it hurts (poetic translation)

Ja visst gör det ont - Karin Boye (link to Karin Boye herself reading, c. 1935)

[arthur-writes]

And in my chamber at home, when there I was, alone, by myself, I would proceed straight to my mirror, my glass, To look at the way that my face seemed If it were any other than it should be Eagerly would I, if it had not been right Amended it with all my ability and might.

My amateur translation of a stanza from Hoccleve's 'Complaint', trying to preserve the original rhyme scheme. Informed by this prose translation from Hoccleve Society.

I've flipped the photo so this is the inverse of my previous post - a reflection or mirror perhaps ;) I chose the motif of scrunched bedsheets because it makes me think privacy/private selves. Practicing who you are around everyone else alone in your bedroom.

[dervishlatino]

Stellar epiphanies (English Translation)

When you became a star, I found refuge in the beautiful night.

Like the moon pulling the strings of the sea, your eyes guided my heart to love.

My dear, you left me an intense mark on my soul— as if you had carved a vast tattoo.

And if another girl wanted to understand me, she, unfortunately, would have to know you too.

✦ @dervishlatino | NNF نشوان نازاريو فيريرا ✦

[polysprachig]

🖊️ Happy World Poetry Day, Everyone!

Seeing as this once used to be a langblr, I thought I'd share links to my poetry translations into English and German. If you like tragedy, the theatre, or the Romantics and want to get pensive about life, death and the muse, you might consider reading any or all of the following:

Rifacimento of the Apollo's foreword to Poliziano's Orfeo, summarising the play (EN)

Zueignung from Goethe's Faust, Teil I (EN)

Voltaire's 'To Be, Or Not To Be' in rhyming verse (EN)

Sehnsucht from Sisi's poetic journal (EN)

Lord Byron's 'To Thyrza' ('Without a stone to mark the spot') in AABB rhyme scheme (DE)

Mary Shelley's Preface to P. B. Shelley's Posthumous Poems and lines 1-40 of 'The Triumph of Life' (DE)

💙 In the spirit of the day, feel free to link me to your favorite poems and/or poetic translations! 💙

[poet2cope]

Odyssey - Book I, 1-10

This convoluted man you’ll tell me about, my Muse,

Did wander far and wide for years, having long since

Laid holy Troy’s most sacred citadel to waste:

He got to know the towns and mind of countless folks,

And suffered many an heartache sailing ‘cross the sea,

In strife for his own life and for his crew’s return.

And yet he did not save them, though he surely tried,

Their foolish minds did seal their final doom instead:

Those idiots ate the cattle of Hyperion Sun,

And he wiped out their hopes of ever coming home.

Do tell us - please - some of that tale, ye child of Zeus!

[qalbofnight]

In Bengali they say:

Aamaay bhaashaaili re

Aamaay doobaaili re

Okool dauriaar boojhi kool naai re

Chaahe aandhi aaye re

Chaahe megha chhaaye re

Hamen tu us paar leke jaana maajhi re

Kool naai kinaar naai

Naai ko dauriaar paari

Shaabdhaane chaalaaiyo maajhi

Aamaar bhaanga tori re

Translation:

You have set me adrift

You are causing me to drown

The river seems endless as if there were no shore

Even if a storm comes, or clouds cover the sky, please carry us to the other shore dear boatsman

No border, no shore

The river has no limits

Steer it most cautiously, boatman

This boat of mine with a broken rim

https://youtu.be/FnDmg-cBVsA?si=VRC47PAAE-b4o1BV

[miyamiwu]

Revising a poem translation I did last year and... god, I HATE translating poetry 😭

I mean, it's fun but

Translating from Tagalog* whose sentence structure (V-S-O) is different from English (S-V-O) is HARD. It makes the original enjambment difficult to keep. I am so tempted to make the lines end-stopped, but who am I to decide how the lines should be cut?

Moreover, the enjambed lines, I just realized, add a sense of perturbation to the persona, whose words in the poem sound completely calm and rational. And I love that because it keeps the delicate balance of intimacy and distance in this poem intact. Removing the enjambment will be reducing the persona to a cold, calculating person.

There's also the matter of what verb tense and aspect to use!

Each Tagalog verb has three basic finite forms which are often referred to as past tense, present tense, and future tense. But this labeling is misleading. The “present tense” form could be used as a past progressive (“She was singing the Ave Maria when I arrived”) as well as a present progressive (“She is singing the Ave Maria”) or present habitual (“She sings the Ave Maria beautifully”). Similarly, the Tagalog “past tense” form can be used like the English simple past (“she sang”) present perfect (“she has sung”), or past perfect (“she had sung”).

– Analyzing Grammar: An Introduction by Paul Kroeger

And oh, don't even get me started on active vs passive voice...

----

*Not using the term “Filipino” because this poem really is only written in Tagalog. There's a difference between the two, and not just politically

[kom-poetry-channel]

I return to Housman with poem 27 of "A Shropshire Lad", a short meditation about life going on. Which is perhaps less comforting if you're the one it's going on without; such is life, as one might say. As in "Queen of Air and Darkness", Housman's very short text makes me imagine a vast swathe of backstory: Was there a love triangle here before it conveniently collapsed with one point's death? Just how grief-struck was the woman, anyway? The dead man's question implies that she wept nightly at some point, but presumably he did not personally observe this.

I had some difficulty finding reasonably thematic images in a consistent style, which is why "used to plough" and "never ask me whose" are AI-generated. The state of the art seems to have advanced immensely since the last time I used image generation, for "Battle Hymn". Both of these are zero-shot, no infill or repeated tweaking of the prompt, except that "England 1900" gave me an upper-class interior on the first attempt which didn't quite have the vibe I was looking for; specifying "a forest in rural England" fixed the background.

No particular comments on the text this time, except to note that I have faithfully reproduced the infelicity of "used to drive / and hear the harness"; perhaps this is intended as a dialect form? It's an odd transition in received-grammar English.