The Poemarium

Francis Ponge - Le Pain (Bread)

La surface du pain est merveilleuse d'abord à cause de cette impression quasi panoramique qu'elle donne : comme si l'on avait à sa disposition sous la main les Alpes, le Taurus ou la Cordillère des Andes. Ainsi donc une masse amorphe en train d'éructer fut glissée pour nous dans le four stellaire, où durcissant elle s'est façonnée en vallées, crêtes, ondulations, crevasses… Et tous ces plans dès lors si nettement articulés, ces dalles minces où la lumière avec application couche ses feux, - sans un regard pour la mollesse ignoble sous-jacente. Ce lâche et froid sous-sol que l'on nomme la mie a son tissu pareil à celui des éponges : feuilles ou fleurs y sont comme des sœurs siamoises soudées par tous les coudes à la fois. Lorsque le pain rassit ces fleurs fanent et se rétrécissent : elles se détachent alors les unes des autres, et la masse en devient friable… Mais brisons-la : car le pain doit être dans notre bouche moins objet de respect que de consommation.

(Francis Ponge, Montpellier, 27 March 1899 - 6 August 1988)

The crust on a loaf of French bread is a marvel, first off, because of the almost panoramic impression it gives, as although one had the Alps, the Taurus range, or even the Andean Cordillera right in the palm of the hand.
In that light, an amorphous belching mass was slipped into the stellar oven on our behalf, and there while hardening, it molded into valleys, ridges, foothills, rifts...And from then on, all those clearly articulated planes, all the wafer-thin slabs where light takes care to bank its rays - without a thought for the disgraceful mush beneath the surface.
That cold soggy substratum, the doughy innards, consists of a sponge-like tissue; there flowers, leaves are fused together at every bend like Siamese twins. When the bread grows stale, the flowes wither and shrink, they come apart from one another and the whole thing goes to crumbs.
But let's cut short here. For bread should be mouthed less as an object of respect than of consumption.

(Translated by Lee Fahnestock, The Nature of Things, Red Dust Inc.)

Louise Glück - Castile

Orange blossoms blowing over Castile
children begging for coins

I met my love under an orange tree
or was it an acacia tree
or was he not my love?

I read this, then I dreamed this:
can waking take back what happened to me?
Bells of San Miguel
ringing in the distance
his hair in the shadows blond-white

I dreamed this,
does that mean it didn't happen?
Does it have to happen in the world to be real?

I dreamed everything, the story
became my story:

he lay beside me,
my hand grazed the skin of his shoulder

Mid-day, then early evening:
in the distance, the sound of a train

But it was not the world:
in the world, a thing happens finally, absolutely,
the mind cannot reverse it.

Castile: nuns walking in pairs through the dark garden.
Outside the walls of the Holy Angels
children begging for coins

When I woke I was crying,
has that no reality?

I met my love under an orange tree:
I have forgotten
only the facts, not the inference—
there were children, somewhere, crying, begging for coins

I dreamed everything, I gave myself
completely and for all time

And the train returned us
first to Madrid
then to the Basque country

(Louise Glück, New York City, 22 April 1943)

Mark Strand - Sorrow

In the hotels of sorrow the guests weep continually
In the shops of sorrow nothing is right and everything costs too much
On the streets of sorrow even the children wear black
In the airports of sorrow all flights are cancelled
In the houses of sorrow no one admits to sorrow
The pastures of sorrow are filled with discarded appliances
The days of sorrow are shadowy and deep
The graveyards of sorrow are happy but empty places
Oh where is the sorrow of sorrows
Say there never will be sorrow greater than this
Parties are such sweet sorrow
Sorrow is the soul's candy
Sorrow can be bought, but it's usually free
The mole and the bat are companions of sorrow
There's the mysterious sorrow of ants with nothing to do
The lovers of sorrow will settle for more of a bad thing
The good old days of sorrow were even worse
A perfect sorrow is almost sorrow
The snows of sorrow just keep falling
The Sorrows are a dance team from Tintern Abbey
The Sorrows hate dancing, which is why they dance
Many sorrows begin with an Easter egg hunt
Other sorrows begin with a swimming pool incident
A song begins when sorrow comes aknockin'

(Mark Strand, Summerside, Prince Edward Island, 11 April 1934)

Antonio Machado - Entre el vivir y el soñar

Entre el vivir y el soñar
hay una tercera cosa.
Adivínala.

(Antonio Machado, Seville, 26 July 1875 - 22 February 1939)

Between living and dreaming
there is a third thing.
Guess what it is.

W.H. Auden - Law like Love

Law, say the gardeners, is the sun,
Law is the one
All gardeners obey
To-morrow, yesterday, to-day.

Law is the wisdom of the old,
The impotent grandfathers feebly scold;
The grandchildren put out a treble tongue,
Law is the senses of the young.

Law, says the priest with a priestly look,
Expounding to an unpriestly people,
Law is the words in my priestly book,
Law is my pulpit and my steeple.

Law, says the judge as he looks down his nose,
Speaking clearly and most severely,
Law is as I've told you before,
Law is as you know I suppose,
Law is but let me explain it once more,
Law is The Law.

Yet law-abiding scholars write:
Law is neither wrong nor right,
Law is only crimes
Punished by places and by times,
Law is the clothes men wear
Anytime, anywhere,
Law is Good morning and Good night.

Others say, Law is our Fate;
Others say, Law is our State;
Others say, others say
Law is no more,
Law has gone away.

And always the loud angry crowd,
Very angry and very loud,
Law is We,
And always the soft idiot softly Me.

If we, dear, know we know no more
Than they about the Law,
If I no more than you
Know what we should and should not do
Except that all agree
Gladly or miserably
That the Law is
And that all know this
If therefore thinking it absurd
To identify Law with some other word,
Unlike so many men
I cannot say Law is again,

No more than they can we suppress
The universal wish to guess
Or slip out of our own position
Into an unconcerned condition.
Although I can at least confine
Your vanity and mine
To stating timidly
A timid similarity,
We shall boast anyway:
Like love I say.

Like love we don't know where or why,
Like love we can't compel or fly,
Like love we often weep,
Like love we seldom keep.

(W.H. Auden – York, 21 February 1907 – 29 September 1973)

Elizabeth Bishop - Questions of Travel

There are too many waterfalls here; the crowded streams 
hurry too rapidly down to the sea, 
and the pressure of so many clouds on the mountaintops 
makes them spill over the sides in soft slow-motion, 
turning to waterfalls under our very eyes. 
--For if those streaks, those mile-long, shiny, tearstains, 
aren't waterfalls yet, 
in a quick age or so, as ages go here, 
they probably will be. 
But if the streams and clouds keep travelling, travelling, 
the mountains look like the hulls of capsized ships, 
slime-hung and barnacled. 

Think of the long trip home. 
Should we have stayed at home and thought of here? 
Where should we be today? 
Is it right to be watching strangers in a play 
in this strangest of theatres? 
What childishness is it that while there's a breath of life 
in our bodies, we are determined to rush 
to see the sun the other way around? 
The tiniest green hummingbird in the world? 
To stare at some inexplicable old stonework, 
inexplicable and impenetrable, 
at any view, 
instantly seen and always, always delightful? 
Oh, must we dream our dreams 
and have them, too? 
And have we room 
for one more folded sunset, still quite warm? 

But surely it would have been a pity 
not to have seen the trees along this road, 
really exaggerated in their beauty, 
not to have seen them gesturing 
like noble pantomimists, robed in pink. 
--Not to have had to stop for gas and heard 
the sad, two-noted, wooden tune 
of disparate wooden clogs 
carelessly clacking over 
a grease-stained filling-station floor. 
(In another country the clogs would all be tested. 
Each pair there would have identical pitch.) 
--A pity not to have heard 
the other, less primitive music of the fat brown bird 
who sings above the broken gasoline pump 
in a bamboo church of Jesuit baroque: 
three towers, five silver crosses. 
--Yes, a pity not to have pondered, 
blurr'dly and inconclusively, 
on what connection can exist for centuries 
between the crudest wooden footwear 
and, careful and finicky, 
the whittled fantasies of wooden footwear 
and, careful and finicky, 
the whittled fantasies of wooden cages. 
--Never to have studied history in 
the weak calligraphy of songbirds' cages. 
--And never to have had to listen to rain 
so much like politicians' speeches: 
two hours of unrelenting oratory 
and then a sudden golden silence 
in which the traveller takes a notebook, writes: 

"Is it lack of imagination that makes us come 
to imagined places, not just stay at home? 
Or could Pascal have been not entirely right 
about just sitting quietly in one's room? 

Continent, city, country, society: 
the choice is never wide and never free. 
And here, or there . . . No. Should we have stayed at home, 
wherever that may be?"

(Elizabeth Bishop, Worcester, Massachussetts, 8 February 1911 - 6 October 1979)

Salvatore Di Giacomo - Na tavernella...

Na tavernella...

        Maggio. Na tavernella
ncopp' 'Antignano: 'addore
d' 'anèpeta nuvella;
'o cane d' 'o trattore
        c'abbaia: 'o fusto 'e vino
nnanz' 'a porta: 'a gallina
ca strilla 'o pulcino:
e n'aria fresca e ffina
        ca vene 'a copp' 'e monte
ca se mmesca c' 'o viento,
e a sti capille nfronte
nun fa truvà cchiù abbiento...
        Stammo a na tavulella
tutte e dduie. Chiano chiano
s'allonga sta manella
e mm'accarezza 'a mano...
        Ma 'o bbi' ca dint'o 'o piatto
se fa fredda 'a frettata?...
Comme me so' distratto!
Comme te si' ncantata!...

(Salvatore di Giacomo, Naples, 12 March 1860 - 4 April 1934)



Translation into Italian from Neapolitan by Pier Paolo Pasolini - Una trattoriola... ) Maggio. Una trattoriola / sopra ad Antignano: odore / di nepinella fresca; / il cane del trattore / che abbaia: la botte del vino / davanti alla porta: / la gallina che strilla al pulcino; / e un'aria fresca e fine / che viene da sopra il monte, / che si mischia col vento, / e a questi capelli in fronte / non lascia trovare pace... / Stiamo seduti a un tavolino / tutti e due.
Piano piano / s'allunga questa manina / e mi carezza la mano... / Ma lo vedi che dentro al piatto / si raffredda la frittata?... / Come mi son distratto! / Come ti sei incantata!..

A Little Inn...

May. At an inn above
Antignano: everywhere
the sweet aroma of
fresh calamint in the air;
the innkeeper's dog nearby,
barking; the barrel of wine
by the door; the hen's shrill cry
to her chick; a fresh and fine
breeze so softly flowing
from the mountain, mixing now
with the wind that keeps on blowing
my hair across my brow...
Here we are seated round
a small table, the two of us.
Slowly this slender hand
takes mine in its caress...
How cold the omelet's become
on the plate, unattended to...
Ah, how distracted I am,
ah, how enchanted are you...


(Translated by Michael Palma)

Czesław Miłosz - Campo di Fiori (Campo dei Fiori)

CAMPO DI FIORI

W Rzymie na Campo di Fiori
Kosze oliwek i cytryn,
Bruk opryskany winem
I odłamkami kwiatów.
Różowe owoce morza
Sypią na stoły przekupnie,
Naręcza ciemnych winogron
Padają na puch brzoskwini.

Tu na tym właśnie placu
Spalono Giordana Bruna,
Kat płomień stosu zażegnął
W kole ciekawej gawiedzi.
A ledwo płomień przygasnął,
Znów pełne były tawerny,
Kosze oliwek i cytryn
Nieśli przekupnie na głowach.

Wspomniałem Campo di Fiori
W Warszawie przy karuzeli,
W pogodny wieczór wiosenny,
Przy dźwiękach skocznej muzyki.
Salwy za murem getta
Głuszyła skoczna melodia
I wzlatywały pary
Wysoko w pogodne niebo.

Czasem wiatr z domów płonących
Przynosił czarne latawce,
Łapali skrawki w powietrzu
Jadący na karuzeli.
Rozwiewał suknie dziewczynom
Ten wiatr od domów płonących,
Śmiały się tłumy wesołe
W czas pięknej warszawskiej niedzieli.

Morał ktoś może wyczyta,
Że lud warszawski czy rzymski
Handluje, bawi się, kocha
Mijając męczeńskie stosy.
Inny ktoś morał wyczyta
O rzeczy ludzkich mijaniu,
O zapomnieniu, co rośnie,
Nim jeszcze płomień przygasnął.

Ja jednak wtedy myślałem
O samotności ginących.
O tym, że kiedy Giordano
Wstępował na rusztowanie,
Nie znalazł w ludzkim języku
Ani jednego wyrazu,
Aby nim ludzkość pożegnać,
Tę ludzkość, która zostaje.

Już biegli wychylać wino,
Sprzedawać białe rozgwiazdy,
Kosze oliwek i cytryn
Nieśli w wesołym gwarze.
I był już od nich odległy,
Jakby minęły wieki,
A oni chwilę czekali
Na jego odlot w pożarze.

I ci ginący, samotni,
Już zapomniani od świata,
Język nasz stał się im obcy
Jak język dawnej planety.
Aż wszystko będzie legendą
I wtedy po wielu latach
Na nowym Campo di Fiori
Bunt wznieci słowo poety.

Warszawa - Wielkanoc, 1943 

Czesław Miłosz,  Šeteniai, 30 June 1911 -14 August 2004)

Campo dei Fiori

In Rome on the Campo dei Fiori

baskets of olives and lemons,

cobbles spattered with wine

and the wreckage of flowers.

Vendors cover the trestles

with rose-pink fish;

armfuls of dark grapes

heaped on peach-down.

On this same square

they burned Giordano Bruno.

Henchmen kindled the pyre

close-pressed by the mob.

Before the flames had died

the taverns were full again,

baskets of olives and lemons

again on the vendors' shoulders.

I thought of the Campo dei Fiori

in Warsaw by the sky-carousel

one clear spring evening

to the strains of a carnival tune.

The bright melody drowned

the salvos from the ghetto wall,

and couples were flying

high in the cloudless sky.

At times wind from the burning

would drift dark kites along

and riders on the carousel

caught petals in midair.

That same hot wind

blew open the skirts of the girls

and the crowds were laughing

on that beautiful Warsaw Sunday.

Someone will read as moral

that the people of Rome or Warsaw

haggle, laugh, make love

as they pass by the martyrs' pyres.

Someone else will read

of the passing of things human,

of the oblivion

born before the flames have died.

But that day I thought only

of the loneliness of the dying,

of how, when Giordano

climbed to his burning

he could not find

in any human tongue

words for mankind,

mankind who live on.

Already they were back at their wine

or peddled their white starfish,

baskets of olives and lemons

they had shouldered to the fair,

and he already distanced

as if centuries had passed

while they paused just a moment

for his flying in the fire.

Those dying here, the lonely

forgotten by the world,

our tongue becomes for them

the language of an ancient planet.

Until, when all is legend

and many years have passed,

on a new Campo dei Fiori

rage will kindle at a poet's word.

Warsaw, 1943

(Translated by Louis Iribarne and David Brooks)

北島 - 拉姆安拉 - Bei Dao - Ramallah

拉姆安拉

在拉姆安拉
古人在星空對奕
殘局忽明忽暗
那被鐘關住的鳥
跳出來報時

在拉姆安拉
太陽象老頭翻牆
穿過农贸市場
在生鏽的銅盤上
照亮了自己

在拉姆安拉
諸神從瓦罐飲水
弓向獨弦問路
一個少年到天邊
去繼承大海

在拉姆安拉
死亡沿正午播種
在我窗前開花
抗拒中樹得颶風 
那狂暴原形

(Bei Dao, Beijing, 2 August 1949)

Ramallah

in Ramallah
the ancients play chess in the starry sky
the endgame flickers 
a bird locked in a clock
jumps out to tell the time

in Ramallah
the sun climbs over the wall like an old man
and goes through the flea market
throwing mirror light on
a rusted copper plate

in Ramallah
gods drink water from earthen jars
a bow asks a string for directions
a boy sets out to inherit the ocean
from the edge of the sky

in Ramallah
seeds sown along the high noon
death blossoms outside my window
resisting, the tree takes on a hurricane's
violent original shape

(Translation by Eliot Weinberger)
-You can listen to the poem read on this page at Lyrikline)