Tonight was the second back-to-back event with Four Way Books authors, hosted by Halsey from White Whale. Halsey was rocking a bold dark lip, like can they stop being so iconic already? Tonight's poets were also translators and it was really horizon broadening to hear poetry read not only in different languages but from different cultural perspectives.
The strange synchronicity with Jewish themes was evident again tonight. Carlie Hoffman translated the works of Selma Meerbaum-Eisinger, a Jewish German poet who died in the labor camp Michailowka in Ukraine. She was 18, and writing some of the most tragically beautiful poetry. Carlie spoke about how her writing involved dreams and nature, which was in its own way, an act of resistance, since these were traditionally "looked down on" in terms of poetic subject matter.
Some of the lines that stuck with me were from the piece "Crystal" --again, the things that stayed with me were the most evocative, such as "a flock of fallen leaves,", "frost jeweled flowers," "an eagle floats overhead," and "a patch of grass the sun has chosen to adore."
Carlie Hoffman also read some of her own poetry, which was just as powerful. There was one poem, "Exoskeleton" that had this line "we grow sick of the prayers we knife into our thighs," which lingered with me.
Rajiv Mohabir was next, and he introduced his work as "deviant translations" meaning he was pushing the translated works as far as he could, so that they may not be recognizable "word for word" but were "situational, specific" and had a lot of energetic musicality.
Some of my favorite lines from Rajiv's translations were "At night my love sits me in a full moon's light," & "At dawn don't leave behind the thought of me and go." Also there was a really interesting line that was like "swagger man, fly mouth, what is true." And in the second to last last piece he read "Bollywood Confabulation" (a great name by any measure) there was this line "Petals shrivel but thorns stay sharp." The very last piece Kalapani utilized the repetition of defining the word, so that each line started with "means" as a continuation from the the title. So Kalapani "means sea crossers" "means to forget secrets and rituals" "means to mislay your name" "means America" "means voyage" "means planting seeds in your ancestors sweat." And was by far the most powerful piece (in my opinion!) that Rajiv read tonight.
The next poet & translator was Ricardo Alberto Maldonado, who was born and raised in Puerto Rico. He is working (with others) on translating a group of Puerto Rican poets whose work goes back as early as 1912. I think it was brave of Ricardo to read his poetry in Spanish--and I wish I knew the language! I did learn from him that Spanish is just as much of a colonial language as English, which is probably obvious to others--but was a shock to me.
The last poet to speak was Marci Calabretta Cancio-Bello who translated poetry from Korean into English. The book "The World's Lightest Motorcycle" was launched January of this year, and Marci worked on the translation alongside E.J. Koh. The poetry was really fascinating in that it blended "ancient Buddhist traditions" with modern technology. There were lines like "People everywhere walk with plugs extended from their body, charged with the world's rage" which is so amazingly precise in regards to what's happening in the world. Another poem was called "Dark and bulging TV in me" and went back and forth between the poets body being "released" in 1968 & this bulky TV from 1990. There were lines from that piece that stayed with me like "Somehow the TV in my body won't turn off" & "things crouching in the darkness, fluttering things."
I also learned from Marci's reading that the Korean language has a "nebulous syntax" because of a lack of punctuation. One of Marci's original poems was just as powerful, in my opinion as Yi Won's, it was called "Origin Adoption" and there was this line that stuck with me: "These days on this other hemisphere, I twist my second mother's words from my tongue, like I do fruit from my neighbors trees." Just stunning & profound imagery.
During the Q&A, the poets were first asked "What came first, fluency or translation?"
For Carlie, translation, specifically a class she took on the subject while obtaining her MFA was what led her into working with Selma's poetry. She said, "If you're a poet, you live with words and music."
Rajiv mentioned how it was traumatizing to lose a language, especially for immigrants as that is a core piece of the past. He described being enchanted by his grandmother's lost language but specifically songs & music. He felt it was a "charge" he was given, spiritually, in this life, to translate the songs & poetry.
Ricardo grew up fluent in Spanish & English, so for him fluency sort of came first. He talked about the ethics and responsibility inherent in translation, and also spoke a bit more about the impacts Hurricane Maria had on his life. He also mentioned Beyonce's lemonade, and how she was ethical in her translation.
Marci was adopted, but her mother was Korean and she described the language as "the heartbeat of her mother" and how it was the language spoken when she was in the womb. That being said, translation came first since she wasn't fluent, being raised, I believe in America.
The second question of the night was the one I submitted, so that was a nice surprise. I asked "Were there any words that were difficult or impossible to translate directly into English? If so, what was the word & what word did you end up using?"
Carlie spoke about how Selma wasn't writing in "High German" but a "secret language" that was a mix of Yiddish & German and involved a lot of neologisms or almost made up words. Also, Selma's poetry involved a lot of rhyming--& Carlie wanted to honor that, but wasn't always able to with the direct translation. To compensate, Carlie talked about using internal rhyming to honor Selma's original poetic style. The word that she referenced that was difficult to translate directly was "Mutterleib" I think, which meant "mother womb." Carlie talked about how important context became in determining how to translate the poetry, and that she would go back through old journals and memoirs to find other ways to dive deeper into the world & time in which the poet was writing.
Rajiv also spoke about the importance of the "Train of Context." He mentioned there were cosmological roadblocks he would run into. He also spoke on the word "juta" (I'm unsure of precise spelling, could be joota or jutaa) which means variously "unclean" or "contaminated" but in the sense that if food has already been touched by someone, or touched their mouth. A good example would be if someone took a drink from a glass & there was "backwash" or if someone ate with a spoon, you wouldn't want to give that used spoon to a guest.
Ricardo spoke on how American idiomatic language could be difficult to translate into Spanish, for example fine differences between "take in," "take on," etc--and how important context became in determining how to translate the text into Spanish. He also spoke about how there were some Spanish words that were "reflexive" with the subject proposed within a word such as the Spanish word for "to love myself."
Marci spoke about difficulty she and her fellow translator had with a prose poem piece called "Between a Rice Bowl and a Shadow" (I think that was the name) in which a "bell" turned up and seemed really out of place. The poet was still alive, so they were able to go directly to the source, and it was referencing a Buddhist funerary bell, which was contextually specific to a ceremony. Marci also talked about how Korean assumes a pronoun is known--so may not specify "you" or "we" or "I" and that the translator has to make a decision about the subject sometimes. Marci asked, "What does accuracy mean?" Is it more accurate to preserve the original poets lyricism & rhythm, or the visual nature of the line, or the specific word meaning? It is a difficult question to answer, but Marci indicated it was easier when working with other translators on the same piece, and that it was important "not to rush" decisions, but to spend time thinking on the matter.
Overall, it was a wonderful experience getting to hear these poets discuss the finer points of translating poetry from other languages, and was a genuine joy to hear them read their original work as well!
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