Thursday, March 8, 2012

A sample from the translations

I thought I'd provide a little taste of the translations. Here is Lidia Valencia-Fourcans' and Hernan Sicilio's take on my poem "What He Found Growing in the Woods":




LO QUE ÉL ENCONTRÓ BROTANDO 
EN LOS BOSQUES

Aire verde y un susurro mohoso.
Tiernos puños apretados en retoño
brotando en helechos de hoja amarga.
Salamandras, desnudas bajo piedras
volcadas; y babosas, reptantes gotas
de moco fresco. Espuma de pompas

cubriendo un dique de árboles caídos.
Cigarras chirriando estridentes credos
y logros. Flores donde antaño ardió la brasa.
Borrosos faisanes marrones agitando
un aire verdoso. Su última rica cabellera
y los primeros bosquejos de barba.


And here is the original:


WHAT HE FOUND GROWING IN THE WOODS

Green air and a rusty babble.
Tender tight fists of fiddleheads
fronding into bitter-leafed ferns.
Salamanders, nude under turned-
over stones, and slugs, creeping beads
of cool snot. Foam of bubbles

coating a dam of fallen tree rubble.
Cicadas scraping shrill creeds
and credentials. Flowers where a fire once burned.
Brown blurred pheasants churning
green air. His last full head
of hair and the first faint traces of stubble.

2 comments:

YLM said...

The "bosquejos"in the last line is a nice touch.

Zachariah Wells said...

Innit, tho?