[lit-ideas] poems
- From: JimKandJulieB@xxxxxxx
- To: lit-ideas@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
- Date: Sun, 10 Apr 2005 11:29:48 EDT
I didn't take a date to post a poem, because I couldn't decide on one. I
just found this, though, which I had discovered years ago, in two
translations.
I wish I knew Russian. I *like* the first translation better -- but what
does that mean?
For some reason I never wrote down the title, but it's by Mayakovsky.
"Then sousing color from the glass,
I smudged the map of everyday;
I showed where on the jelly dish
the ocean's slanted cheekbones lay,
Upon the scales of the tin fish
I have read new lips sounding off.
And you, could you
play a nocturne
upon the flute
of an eaves trough?"
"I splashed some colours from a glass
and smeared the drab world with emotion.
I charted on a dish of jelly
the jutting features of the sea.
Upon the scals of a tin fish
I read the cells of lips still silent.
And you, could you have played a nocturne
with just a drainpipe for a flute?"
Julie Krueger
wondering if poetry can *ever* be translated
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