Robin Ouzman Hislop is on line Editor at Poetry Life & Times at Artvilla.com. His numerous appearances include Cold Mountain Review (Appalachian University, N.Carolina), The Honest Ulsterman, Cratera No 3 and Aquillrelle’s Best. His publications are collected poems All the Babble of the Souk, Cartoon Molecules, Next Arrivals & Moon Selected Audio Textual Poems and translations from Spanish of poems by Guadalupe Grande Key of Mist and Carmen Crespo Tesserae (the award winning XIII Premio César Simón De Poesía). In November 2017 these works were presented in a live performance at The International Writer’s Conference hosted by the University of Leeds, UK. A forthcoming publication of collected poems Off the Menu is expected in 2020.
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Robin Ouzman Hislop is Editor of Poetry Life and Times at Artvilla.com . You may visit Aquillrelle.com/Author Robin Ouzman Hislop about author. See Robin performing his
work Performance (University of Leeds)
Poem
Almost A Nocturne. A Poem by Noni Benegas Translated from Spanish by Amparo Arrospide and Robin Ouzman Hislop
Editor’s note: this poem is a lengthy text, the translation is given first & then the original follows & finally the relevant bio info.
Almost a nocturne
– and out of dark of night,
One thing alone grows darker – our eyes.
Marina Tsvetaeva
“This Minister, in spite of his frivolous air and his polished manners,
was not blessed with a soul of the French type; he could not forget the
things that annoyed him. When there was a thorn in his pillow, he was
obliged to break it off and to blunt its point by repeated stabbings
of his throbbing limbs.”
Stendhal, The Charterhouse of Parma
Guilt is an argument
to feel alive...
Fear, another.
Defense, any improvised defense
is another;
being smarter than someone else
(and being told so)
is yet another.
To remember
how we had prepared everything
to write without guilt
instead of loafing about
is perhaps the best argument.
not to sleep a wink
and feel life slip by.
To worry about distant friends
who do not call, not knowing
if they' re still alive
yet another,
but the maximum argument
to feel alive is to feel
that you're wasting your time.
Any incentive that heals
the "malheur de vivre"
is a force driving the guilt
of being alive
but insufficiently.
To think that nobody cares,
that there is no friend
aware of you
makes us prone to guilt
which in turn lets us
experience being alive.
I refuse to speak in the first person
because I don't know
if I'm an individual
alive
outside language.
It's the time when wolves
go out to howl at inhospitable
nature …
I barely feel my toes
scratch the edge of the bed
rub each other
like sticks on distant drums.
Their percussion reverberates
through my body with waxed ears
of a mummy
but more alive,
than Clarice's clock
pounding at dawn.
Nothing makes sense,
Would it, if I'd lived with you,
X, H or J of my past, present, or future?
And here, I survive
without a dog or cat
or a clock.
But even so
even if
I waste time on this
my mental calculator
catches on
and condemns me
to experience
the guilt that makes me feel alive
in a bad way...
In this uncertain
existence, to the friend who feeds us
to reinforce their link
while feeding ours,
I reply with warmth
but no tea,
because it keeps you awake
and makes you think
which prevents
living
as something natural.
Living is natural …
Like this light coolness
on my back
and this slight discomfort
of a quilt too warm,
making you successively
put off and on
words with their doubts, meanderings:
live, living, surviving.
Little by little
an appetite is born.
I continue living
as I begin to wake up
turning in bed
-left , right-
wanting day to come
promising “ficar bonito”.
I begin to understand
St John Perse's list of posts ...
It must have been
at dawn,
scattered like a man's crumbs
through his long lined verse
whose sum make the poem.
And I'm already awake,
while tire wheels roll
like waves on the sidewalk,
behind a closed glass
with a drawn curtain
already standing
already rhetorical.
Haven't you ever thought of having children
friend ?
you wouldn't be able to sleep at night
for their screams.
But a part of you could do it
although another's life
isn't an argument
to lose sleep over
or recover it.
There are borders between us,
jagged boundaries as between
stamps.
I turn off
and on...
the coolness on my back persists...
as if after so much searching
my back was the dark side of the moon
my feet explore
at the bottom of galaxies
through black holes
tunnelling under the quilt
at the edge of the bed.
Between turning on and off
there is a photogenesis of night
that appears
at will.
Click, clack
René Daumal
click, clack
Lota Macedo
click, clack
Oscar Manesi
click, clack
Alejandra Pizarnik
click, clack
me you him
blasphemy
error.
An association is like placing a carriage on a track
to set it in motion...
Thus night rolls
with a click
like Clarice's clock;
the clock is a camera filming
passing time.
What a big animal
in the dark!
I don't know my limits ...
I turn on the light
for the shameful life
of that autonomous hand
filming
on paper, with pencil,
the poet´s task,
the one who writes
as a movie shot
in which I'm absent.
Only the coolness
and the instep of my right foot
as it molds my left leg's calf
gives me back my limits.
How disgusting life is
when you want to go to the toilet!
But it's just a plane traversing
your hollow belly over the Gulf of Mexico
before the storm
is unleashed.
Not disregarding
that being alive ...
is a way of being
harassed
by terrestrial functions.
Body drifting ...
But there is too much light
to say so.
Night fails
and is rhetorical.
Darkness
orders and disorders the world
at the same time.
I would like to be hungry
or pee to stand up again
not this coolness without limits.
She/he lied to me
and now they pay the price
by losing the meaning
of their lie.
The only reason
for being alive
is to whisper these things
in my ear.
Night is a field
of phosphenes and barbed wire
that starts in the frontal lobe.
As long as my mouth
pours this fluidity
from above
I will believe in a soul,
click, clack,
and in Madrid
I switch on
the light
in my Paris room
knowing
through this touch
I exist
click, clack,
at dawn.
I want to roll myself up in the quilt
in an interspatial rocket
riding the coolness of galaxies ...
Not this earthly
red light
but the dust of stars
precipitated suddenly blue.
How relative
language is…
Little by little I recover
to form a notion of reality,
to breath for my frontal lobe
so it becomes night once more.
My only privacy
is with myself.
At times I'm so far
I don't recognize myself,
but they talk to me, watch me
and there I am,
at times I'm so close
I can spare knowing me.
In the morning I will recover
myself
like one who puts her toes
inside the quilt's capsule
so that they form a whole,
so that they complete a whole.
To the traitor/ess
I do not recognize you
as a person,
you're not on my path
or maybe yes, as one more mask.
This I know now.
I don't know if I'll know later
when the various layers
of myself
overlap
and I fly over the cosmos
in the space capsule
of my quilt.
But my balance is so delicate
that I can try to be me
again:
some do try again
for the pleasure of recognizing ourselves...
By Noni Benegas. Original: CASI UN NOCTURNO
Translated by Robin Ouzman & Amparo Arrospide
Casi un nocturno
y en la noche oscura
nada se cierne más oscuro sobre nosotros
que nuestros propios ojos
Marina Tsvetaeva
"Ese ministro, a pesar de sus modales ligeros y brillantes, no tenía
el alma a la francesa; no sabía olvidar las penas. Cuando en su almohada
había una espina, tenía por fuerza que romperla y gastarla a fuerza de
herir con ella su cuerpo palpitante"
Stendhal, La cartuja de Parma.
La culpa es un argumento
para sentirse vivo…
El miedo, otro.
La defensa, cualquier defensa improvisada
otro;
ser más inteligente que alguien
(y que lo digan)
también.
Recordar cómo habíamos preparado todo
para escribir sin culpa
en vez de haraganear,
el mejor, quizás.
a fin de no pegar ojo
y sentir la vida pasar.
Preocuparse por los amigos lejanos
que no llaman y se ignora si aún viven
también sirve,
pero el argumento máximo
para sentirse vivo es sentir
que se está perdiendo el tiempo.
Cualquier aliciente que cure
del malheur de vivre
es un propulsor de la culpa
del hecho de estar vivo
sin estarlo lo suficiente.
Pensar que a nadie le importa
y no hay amistad
que se interese,
nos hace proclives a la culpa
que a su vez permite
la sensación de estar vivos.
Y me niego a hablar en singular
porque no sé si yo,
fuera del lenguaje,
estoy viva
en particular.
Es la hora en que los lobos
salen a aullar a la naturaleza
inhóspita…
Apenas percibo los dedos de mis pies
que arañan el borde de la cama
y se frotan entre si
como palillos sobre lejanos tambores.
Su percusión reverbera
en mi cuerpo con oídos encerados de momia
más vivo,
sin embargo,
que el reloj de Clarice
palpitando en la madrugada.
Nada tiene sentido.
¿Lo tendría si viviera contigo,
X, H o J de mi pasado, presente, o futuro?
Y aquí
sin un perro ni un gato
ni un reloj a mi alrededor
sobrevivo.
Aún así,
si pierdo el tiempo
la máquina calculadora de mi cerebro
barrunta la falta
y me condena
a la culpa que me hace sentir viva
de mala manera…
Al amigo que nos da de comer
para reafirmar su vínculo
y alimentar el nuestro
le replico, en esta incertidumbre
de existir, con simpatía
pero sin té,
porque quita el sueño
y te hace pensar,
lo cual impide vivir como algo natural.
Vivir es natural…
Como este ligero frescor
en la espalda
y la leve molestia
del edredón demasiado cálido,
que hace que te quites y pongas,
sucesivamente,
las palabras con sus dudas y recovecos:
vivo, viviente, sobreviviente.
De a poco nace
el apetito.
Sigo viviendo
a medida que despierto
y volteo sobre la cama
-izquierda, derecha-
con ganas de que venga el día
y pueda
ficar bonito.
Empiezo a entender
la enumeración de oficios en Saint John Perse…
Tiene que haber sido
de madrugada,
mendrugos de hombre
desparramados en el versículo
cuya suma hace el poema.
Amago levantarme
mientras ruedan neumáticos
como olas en la vereda,
tras el cristal cerrado
con la cortina echada,
ya de pie
y ya retórica.
¿No has pensado tener hijos
amiga ?
no podrías dormir de noche
por sus gritos.
Pero una parte tuya sí podría hacerlo;
aunque no es argumento
la vida ajena
para perder el sueño
o recuperarlo.
Hay bordes entre nosotros,
límites dentados como entre
las estampillas.
Apago
y enciendo…
y sigue el frescor en la espalda…
como si después de tanto buscar
fuese el lado oscuro de la luna,
que los pies investigan
al fondo de las galaxias
por los agujeros negros,
túneles bajo el edredón,
hacia el borde de la cama.
Y entre encender y apagar
hay una fotogénesis de la noche
que aparece
a voluntad.
Clic, clac
René Daumal
clic, clac
Lota Macedo
clic, clac
Oscar Manesi
clic, clac
Alejandra Pizarnik
clic, clac
yo, tú, él
blasfemia
error.
Y una asociación es como poner un vagón en una vía
y echarlo a andar…
Así la noche con el clic
rueda
como el reloj de Clarice;
el reloj es la cámara que filma
el tiempo que pasa.
¡Qué animal tan grande
en la oscuridad…!
No conozco mis límites…
Enciendo
para la vergüenza de vivir
de esa mano autónoma filmando
sobre papel, con lápiz,
la tarea del poeta,
del que escribe como una toma de película
en la que no estoy.
Sólo el frescor
me devuelve mis límites,
y el empeine del pie derecho
cuando moldea la pantorrilla
de la pierna izquierda.
Qué asco vivir
cuando tienes ganas de ir al baño!
Pero es sólo un avión que atraviesa
la oquedad de tu vientre como el golfo de México
antes de desencadenarse
una tormenta.
Sin perder de vista
que estar vivo…
es una manera de estar
acosado
por las funciones terrestres.
Cuerpo a la deriva…
Pero hay demasiada luz
para decirlo.
Falla la noche y es
retórico.
La oscuridad
desordena el mundo a la vez
que lo ordena.
Quisiera tener hambre
o pis para reincorporarme
y no este frescor sin límites.
Me mintió
y ahora paga su mentira
con la desaparición del objeto
de su mentira.
La única razón
de estar viva
es poder dictarme estas cosas
al oído.
La noche es un campo
de fosfenos y alambradas
que empieza en el lóbulo frontal.
Mientras la boca esté derramando
ésta liquidez de arriba
creeré en el alma,
clic, clac,
y aprieto el interruptor
de mi cuarto en París
en otra lámpara
en Madrid,
y sé que existo
por este tacto
clic, clac,
en la madrugada.
Me quiero arrollar en el edredón
con forma de cohete interespacial
para surcar el frescor de las galaxias…
No esta luz colorada
de la tierra
sino el polvo de estrellas,
precipitado súbitamente azul.
Cómo relativiza
el lenguaje…
De a poco me recupero
y cobro noción de lo real;
respiro para mi lóbulo,
para que sea de noche otra vez.
No tengo intimidad
más que conmigo misma.
Y a veces estoy tan lejos
que no me reconozco,
pero me hablan, y miran,
y ahí me encuentro.
Aunque a veces estoy tan cerca
que me eximo de conocerme.
Por la mañana me recuperaré
como quien mete los dedos de los pies
en la cápsula del edredón
para que formen un todo,
para que completen el todo.
Al traidor/ra
No te reconozco
como persona,
no estás en mi camino
o tal vez sí, una máscara más.
Esto que sé ahora
no sé si lo sabré luego
cuando diversas capas de mi
se superpongan,
y en la cápsula espacial
de mi edredón conmigo
sobrevuele el cosmos.
Pero mi equilibrio es tan delicado
que yo puedo volver a ser yo:
algunos volvemos a repetirnos
por el placer de reconocernos…
Noni Benegas, born in Buenos Aires and resident in Spain since 1977, is the author of seven books of poetry; a selection is collected in El Ángel de lo súbito, Ed. Fondo de Cultura Económica, (Madrid, 2014). Burning Cartography, Ed. Host, (Austin TX, 2007 and 2011) is a selection of these poems in English, and Animaux Sacrés, Ed. Al Manar (Séte 2013) in French. She has won the Platero Prize from the UN in Geneva; the Miguel Hernández National Prize for Poetry, as well as Vila de Martorell award, the Rubén Darío Prize from Palma in Mallorca, the Esquío Prize in Galicia. She is the author of the influential anthology of contemporary Spanish women poets Ellas tienen la palabra, Ed. Hiperión (Madrid, 2008, 4th edition) whose introductory essay, with a new prologue, articles, interviews and an epilogue has been recently collected by Ed. Fondo de Cultura Economica in 2017 with the same title. Ellas Resisten. Mujeres poetas y artistas (1994-2019) is a selection of her essays on women writers and artists published by Ed. Huerga & Fierro
Editor’s Note: see also Poetry, National Literature Prize 2018, Francisca Aguirre, Translated from Spanish by Amparo Arróspide & Robin Ouzman Hislop
Amparo Arróspide (Argentina) has published five poetry collections: Presencia en el Misterio, Mosaicos bajo la hiedra, Alucinación en dos actos y algunos poemas, Pañuelos de usar y tirar and En el oído del viento, as well as poems, short stories and articles on literature and films in anthologies and international magazines. She has translated authors such as Francisca Aguirre, Javier Díaz Gil, Luis Fores and José Antonio Pamies into English, together with Robin Ouzman Hislop, who she worked with for a period as co-editor of Poetry Life and Times, at Artvilla.com a Webzine. Her translations into Spanish of Margaret Atwood (Morning in the Burned House), James Stephens (Irish Fairy Tales) and Mia Couto (Vinte e Zinco) are in the course of being published, as well as her two poetry collections Hormigas en diáspora and Jacuzzi. She takes part in festivals, recently Transforming with Poetry (Leeds) and Centro de Poesía José Hierro (Getafe).
https://www.facebook.com/PoetryLifeTimes
https://www.twitter.com/PoetryLifeTimes
Robin Ouzman Hislop is Editor of Poetry Life and Times ; at Artvilla.com his publications include
All the Babble of the Souk , Cartoon Molecules, Next Arrivals, Collected Poems, and the recently published Moon Selected Audio Textual Poems, as well as translation of Guadalupe Grande´s La llave de niebla, as Key of Mist and the recently published Tesserae , a translation of Carmen Crespo´s Teselas.
You may visit Aquillrelle.com/Author Robin Ouzman Hislop about author. See Robin performing his work Performance (University of Leeds)
Spike. Excerpt from Moon Selected Audio Textual Poems by Robin Ouzman Hislop
A runaway on a Singularity slippery slope need not be a despairingly
Sisyphean slide back but spike upward to an extremely great verticality
allowing something relatively harmless today start a trend that results
in something currently unthinkable a – Pandorean pandemonium
still he didn’t want to kill himself and his crew so he hatched a plan
that systems possessing the same patterns of causal organization will instantiate
the same types of conscious states irrespective of whether the organization
is implemented in neurons – silicon – plastic or any other substrate
taken to its heart we would vanish into its stronger existence – do the angels
really only take back what is theirs – what has streamed out of them – or is there
sometimes – as if by oversight something of our being as well? – do we not see
the swirling return to ourselves (how should we see it?) the world today being
as it is a vast unsupervised laboratory – in which a multitude of experiments
are simultaneously under way
brain-computer interfaces have already left the laboratory which allows gamers
to interact directly with their consoles – a high resolution neuro-signal
acquisition and processing wireless neuroheadset uses a set of sensors to tune
into electric signals produced by the brain to detect player thoughts feelings
and expressions and connects wirelessly to most PCs’ — all this for only $299!
partly this is because we cannot agree on what such purposes are – and even if
we were to – suddenly he knew that when he heard the music he would be unable
to resist steering toward the island’s rocks – the problem wasn’t the present
rational Ulysses – but instead the future illogical Ulysses – the person he’d become
when the Sirens came within earshot
but that is the gods’ affair – if only we too could discover a pure contained – human
place – a strip of fruitful land of our own – between river and stone!- for our own heart
exceeds us – the curve of the graph grows exponentially steeper – until that spike is
the Singularity – beyond the veil of the opaque wall – the unthinkable – the horizon
of the final dawn looms – lanced on the spear of the terrible angel.
After Rainer Maria Rilke. Duino Elegies
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Robin Ouzman Hislop is Editor of Poetry Life and Times ; at Artvilla.com his publications include
All the Babble of the Souk , Cartoon Molecules, Next Arrivals, Collected Poems, and the recently published Moon Selected Audio Textual Poems, as well as translation of Guadalupe Grande´s La llave de niebla, as Key of Mist and the recently published Tesserae , a translation of Carmen Crespo´s Teselas.
You may visit Aquillrelle.com/Author Robin Ouzman Hislop about author. See Robin performing his work Performance (University of Leeds)
Poems from Angel Minaya’s Collected Poems TEOREMA DE LOS LUGARES RAROS (Theorem of rare places) Translated from Spanish by Robin Ouman Hislop & Amparo Arróspide
1.
lugar es una casa para poner un codo no deja de dañar la mesa también sobre los
huesos un palo sus balances
lugar es una puerta para esconder la carga perdura en la cabeza aislada el rastrillo de la
deuda tatúa las membranas
lugar es una ventana para poner un caballo un libro alguna cosa
(i)
place is a house to place an elbow the table never leaves off hurting it´s also a stick
on the bones balance sheets
place is a door to hide the burden on an isolated head the rake of debt lingers
tattooing membranes
place is a window to place a horse a book some thing
2.
un niño pasea por las orillas del légamo se parece a mi sombra tiene miedo pero no corre
tal vez sus pies han oído el acre perfume de la ova animales suaves se agitan en el cañizal
un ciervo tendido va confundiéndose con las hojas caídas su cuello muestra linfas secretas el
sol cruje con la intensidad de la corteza columpios oxidados anticipan la ruina de los juegos
juegos solitarios donde el niño me imagina soñando con orillas recordando carroñas sin volumen
el agua verdinegra que el verano va cociendo ambos somos un sueño compartido por el otro
observados bajo las cañas por los ojos feroces de nuestra madre
a child passes silted shores seeming like my shadow he’s afraid but doesn’t run perhaps his
feet have heard the acrid perfume of the ulva soft animals tremble in reed banks a deer
lying down mingles with fallen leaves his neck revealing a secret lymph sun crackles through
intensity of bark rusty swings herald a ruination of games solitary games where I’m imagined
by the child to be dreaming of these shores a massless memory of carrion the summer’s
blackgreenish water is baking we are both a dream shared by the other watched under the
reeds by the fierce eyes of our mother
3.
Conferencia austro-húngara [apuntes]
antes de comenzar imaginemos
pensar en húngaro o escribir en alemán
alguien recoge lo que ama y lo corrige
alguien hubiera preferido someter a reconstrucción una pared escarpada
y ahora yo llevo bajo el brazo
el vínculo entre la fuerza y la risa
el caso es
de dónde procede este placer
después de qué aniquilación maduran los conceptos
por qué admiramos los átomos o la madrugada
queridos colegas
por) un agresor ha sido devorado
como) la frialdad de las madres es comparable a las máquinas zapadoras
en) lo que permanece dentro siempre resulta victorioso
en fin por) como) y en) prueban que una idea es lo más parecido a una cicatriz
o a un sueño que dura ya 51 años
en alemán los ahogados
beben hasta que les llega la muerte
en húngaro los mensajes indirectos acaban alojándose
en órganos e inervaciones habituales
buenas tardes y gracias a todos
por su aflicción
Austro-Hungarian Conference [Notes]
before we begin let us imagine
thinking in Hungarian or writing in German
someone picks up what they love and corrects it
someone would have preferred to rebuild a steep wall
and now I’m carrying under my arm
the link between strength and laughter
the case is
where does this pleasure come from
after what annihilation do concepts mature
why do we admire atoms or the dawn
dear colleagues
by) a foe has been devoured
as) the coldness of mothers is comparable to trenching machines
in) what remains inside is always victorious
hence by) as) and in) prove that an idea is the closest thing to a scar
or a dream that has already lasted for 51 years
in German the drowned
drink themselves to death
in Hungarian indirect messages end up occupying
the usual organs and innervations
good evening thank you all for listening
and thank you all for your suffering
4.
Apuntes catastróficos
contraimagen en el observador nace un estado de malestar o acantilado
contradicción la luz sobre el terraplén se degrada en movimiento
estímulos la vida es una erosión subterránea equivalente al plano inclinado de la
angustia
contragolpe un árbol despliega la tierra rota en dirección al sol blanco de la
analogía
contrapunto los dominios zoológicos se ramifican y expanden como nudos que se
persiguen
impresiones la caza y los territorios acumulan conglomerados de mapas y
desprendimientos
contrasentido un cono o pirámide de escombros pasa de la regularidad a la máxima
turbulencia
contraataque el observador es una trampa para frecuencias de lenta degradación
reducto un germen de catástrofe en favor de la excitación y el desorden
Catastrophic Notes
counter image a cliff state or discomfort is born in the observer
contradiction the light on the embankment degrades in movement
stimuli life is an underground erosion equivalent to the inclined plane of anguish
countercoup a tree displays broken earth towards the white sun of analogy
counterpoint zoological domains ramify their expansions pursued as knots
impressions hunting and territories accumulate clusters of maps and landslides
countermeaning the debris of a cone or pyramid goes from regularity to maximum turbulence
counterassault the observer is a trap for frequencies of slow degradation
stronghold a germ of catastrophe in favor of excitement and disorder
5.
Equivalencia en hueco
[nada] evento de la palabra que lo pronuncia [nunca] agujero o gusano de tiempo oscuro [nadie]
impensada extensión de una antinomia que se fue [nulo] valor absoluto del abandono [pérdida]
extravío en la dirección apropiada [mudez] propósito semántico del niño en silencio [se]
impersonal atavismo del aullido [cero] punto lógico del número a su saco [no] jaque a la
tercera persona oblicua [yo] identidad imaginaria de la cópula y la disyunción [negro] color
automático de las orillas en materia de movimiento [vacío] mensaje contracto del negativo de
los objetos [incógnita] conjunto dispar de soluciones y raíces antes del árbol [significado]
liquidar el poema de materia oscura
del doble tan raro
decirse no expresarse
aunque [yo] estuviera allí
GAP-IN EQUIVALENCE
[nothing] an event from the word that articulates it [never] a dark time or worm hole [nobody]
an unthought extension of a vanished antinomy [null] the absolute value of abandonment [loss]
a misplacement in the proper direction [muteness] the semantic intention of a child’s silence
[self] an impersonal atavistic howl [zero] the number’s logical point in its sac [not] the
oblique third person placed in check [i] imaginary identity of conjunction and disjunction
[black] the automatic color of edges in the materialisation of motion [vacuum] a message shrunk from the
negatives of photographic objects [unknown] a disparate set of solutions and roots preceding
their tree [meaning] to wipe dark matter out of the poem
by such a rare double
to tell oneself not to express oneself
even though as if [i] was there
6.
WCW 1963
amo las cosas esas cizañas que no dejan ver el mar el sabor oculto de las fresas perceptible
solo en su consumación el zorzal una danza leve en la luz amarilla
hoy una mano escribe y la otra me hace viva la muerte
en otro tiempo el día era el ascenso mis manos ayudaban a nacer palpaban el dolor y la noche
el descenso la medida variable de los huesos quebrados por la música
ahora el perro y la fiebre la oscuridad extensa donde nada tiene cura
van cayendo los ciegos los aros giran la espalda del desierto es la tortuga que sostiene el
mundo
WCW 1963
i love things those ryegrasses not letting you see the sea hidden taste of strawberries
perceptible only in their consummation a thrush a light dance in the yellow light
today one hand is writing and the other is making death alive for me
in another time a day was the ascent my hands helped to give birth they touched pain and night
the descent the variable measure of bones broken by music
Now the dog and the fever a vast darkness where nothing can be cured
the blind are falling rings are turning round the spine of the desert is the turtle supporting
the world
***
Translations from Spanish by Amparo Arróspide & Robin Ouzman Hislop
***
ANGEL MINAYA (Madrid, 1964), a Bachelor in Hispanic Philology by the Complutense University of
Madrid, was also awarded in PhD in Linguistics by the Autonomous University of Madrid.
A teacher of Literature and Language at a high school in that same Community, some of his poems
and critical reviews have been published by Nayagua literary e-zine. A few have also been
included in the anthology Voces del extremo: Poesía y desobediencia (Madrid, 2014).
Teorema de los lugares raros (Theorem of rare places) is his first published poetry collection
(El sastre de Apollinaire, Madrid, 2017).
http://www.elsastredeapollinaire.com/producto/teorema-de-los-lugares-raros/
https://www.facebook.com/angel.minayaechevarrena
Amparo Arróspide (Argentina) has published five poetry collections: Presencia en el Misterio, Mosaicos bajo la hiedra, Alucinación en dos actos y algunos poemas, Pañuelos de usar y tirar and En el oído del viento, as well as poems, short stories and articles on literature and films in anthologies and international magazines. She has translated authors such as Francisca Aguirre, Javier Díaz Gil, Luis Fores and José Antonio Pamies into English, together with Robin Ouzman Hislop, who she worked with for a period as co-editor of Poetry Life and Times, at Artvilla.com a Webzine. Her translations into Spanish of Margaret Atwood (Morning in the Burned House), James Stephens (Irish Fairy Tales) and Mia Couto (Vinte e Zinco) are in the course of being published, as well as her two poetry collections Hormigas en diáspora and Jacuzzi. She takes part in festivals, recently Transforming with Poetry (Leeds) and Centro de Poesía José Hierro (Getafe).
https://www.facebook.com/PoetryLifeTimes
https://www.twitter.com/PoetryLifeTimes
Robin Ouzman Hislop is Editor of Poetry Life and Times ; at Artvilla.com his publications include
All the Babble of the Souk , Cartoon Molecules, Next Arrivals Collected Poems, and the recently published Moon Selected Audio Textual Poems, as well as translation of Guadalupe Grande´s La llave de niebla, as Key of Mist and the recently published Tesserae , a translation
of Carmen Crespo´s Teselas.
You may visit Aquillrelle.com/Author Robin Ouzman Hislop about author. See Robin performing his work Performance (University of Leeds)
Poems from Laura Giordani translated from Spanish by Amparo Arróspide & Robin Ouzman Hislop
Language is the territory of the common, of the community. Through my writing I try to make visible not only what is not so due to our sensory handicap, but what has been made invisible: small daily holocausts, omissions, our most intimate violence.
Poetic language contains the seed of insubordination, of becoming disobedient to a way of looking at the world and naming it; politics is the place where we situate ourselves to articulate as speakers, enlightened, subaltern, omniscient, decentered, etc.
It does not matter if we do it about a bird, a milk tooth or an intimate event. In my opinion, the political load of a poem is not dependent on certain topics, but on the insistence that invites us to breathe in a system that otherwise suffocates us, to resist so that we don’t let our eyelids drop in resignation.
Editor’s Note: extract from an interview with Laura Giordani. http://www.tendencias21.net/ Laura-Giordani-La-poesia- contiene-la-semilla-de-la- insumision_a13660.html
————————–
(i.)
[Qué te hicieron caballito, que las manos de tu amo
se hundan en tu carne abierta
hasta que llore polvo de ladrillo,
hasta que la fusta con que te azotaba
caiga con él de rodillas.
Con manos imantadas
Hundir los dedos en la tierra negrísima de la infancia, Cuando las yemas ardan, escarbar con manos imantadas por una ternura abandonada junto a los restos: el desguace nuestro.
Botones sueltos, fotografías de familia: los esposos en un muelle con cuatro hijos y dos baúles, un viejo de ojos claros junto a su silla de enea, escarpines de lana amarilleando sin término, el ajuar con las mismas iniciales de aquel ataúd chiquito y blanco.
Un mechoncito rubio en la mano, único consuelo.
Mujeres pariendo en camas de hierro, niños amamantados por cabras.
[veni, sonnu, di la muntanedda
lu lupu si mangiau la picuredda
oi ninì
ninna vò fa1
A la infancia a través de las manos, palpar el fondo de los cajones para conocer el revés nuestro, las costuras de un relato siempre en hilachas.
Ella se fue y algo se rompió dentro
[algo sordo, como llorando.
Escondimos las rodillas lastimadas por el pavimento.
Llegaron como una peste las palabras y las llevamos a la boca creyendo en su alimento.
Los contornos adquirieron relieve, los pétalos del corazón fueron cayendo –uno a uno—como en aquel juego.
Sobrevino la sintaxis, la separación, el desastre.
[La guardiana del tacto]
1. Nota: Canción de cuna siciliana. Oh, ven, sueño, de la montañita / El lobo se comió a la ovejita / Oh, el niño /Quiere dormir.
(i.)
[What did they do you little horse that the hands of your master
should sink into your opened flesh
until it weeps brick dust
until the whip with which he lashes you
falls with him to his knees.
With magnetised hands
To sink our fingers into the blackest earth of childhood, when fingertips burn, hands magnetised by a discarded tenderness that dig searching the remains – our scrap.
Loose buttons, family photographs: spouses on the quayside with four children, two trunks, an old man with clear eyes next to his wicker chair, woollen stockings forever fading, the trousseau with the same initials as that little white coffin, a little lock of blonde hair held in the hand their only consolation.
Women giving birth in iron beds, children suckled by goats.
[veni, sonnu, di la muntanedda
lu lupu si mangiau la picurredda
oi nini
ninna vó fa*
Childhood reached through our hands feeling the bottom of drawers
knowing our underside, the seams of a story always in rags.
She left and something broke inside.
[something deaf, as if weeping
We hid our knees scraped on the pavement.
Words came like a disease, we put them in our mouths believing in their nourishment.
Outlines became distinct, one by one, as in that childhood game, the petals of innocence fell.
Then syntax, separation, disaster.
[The Guardian of Touch]
* Sicilian Lullaby. Oh come, sleep, from the little mountain/The wolf ate the little lamb/Oh, the child/Wants to sleep.
(ii.)
Con guantes de goma anaranjada ella ahogaba los cachorros recién nacidos en el fuentón de lata: no son puros, seguro que fueron los perros de Moroni – sentenciaba y aguantando la respiración hundía a los perritos todavía ciegos, buscando el calor de la collie que aullaba junto a la puerta. Anegaba sus pulmones en el fondo hasta que flotaran y los metía en una bolsa de nylon que cerraba con nudos bien apretados. Luego se sacaba los guantes color naranja y con esas mismas manos cortaba el pan y trenzaba el pelo de mi amiga Alejandra.
[Todavía me persigue el llanto de aquella perra,
el frío mortal del lavadero.
Mi amiga creció, tuvo hijos, otra casa. Su madre siguió baldeando con desvelo la vereda cada mañana, ahogando – primavera tras primavera—perros sin raza.
[Extraño país]
(ii.)
With orange rubber gloves, she, my friend’s mother, drowned the new born pups, in a tin basin.
These are mongrels, sure from old Morini’s, she judged, as she held her breath to drown the still blind puppies as they searched the warmth of the collie, who howled beside the laundry door.
She flooded their lungs in the bottom until they floated putting them into a nylon bag that she tied in the tightest of knots.
Afterwards, she took off those orange rubber gloves and with the same hands cut bread and braided my friend Alejandra’s hair.
[Now the howl still haunts me
deadly cold in the wash place.
My friend grew up, had children, another house. Her mother continued every morning to thoroughly wash the pavement down drowning spring after spring mixed breeds.
[ Strange Country]
(iii.)
El sobretodo azul que pusiste
sobre los hombros de la muchacha aquella
volvía empapada del interrogatorio
temblando
la mojaban la picaneaban*
cada noche
la dejaban junto a tu colchón
con un llanto parecido al de un cachorro
ese gesto a pesar del miedo
a pesar del miedo te sacaste el sobretodo azul
para abrigarla
no poder dejar de darle ese casi todo
en medio del sobretodo espanto
la dignidad puede resistir
azul
en apenas dos metros de tela
y en esos centímetros que tu mano
sorteó en la oscuridad hasta sus hombros
sobre todo
[El sobretodo azul]
(iii.)
The blue overcoat you put on over the shoulders of the girl soaked from interrogation shaking watered tortured with the picana1 each night they´d left her next to your mattress with a puppylike whimper that gesture despite the fear over all the fear you took off your blue overcoat to warm her unable to resist giving over all over all the horror in its midst dignity can stand blue in just two meters of cloth those centimeters your hand covered in the dark over her shoulders over all else.
[The blue overcoat]
1 The “picana” is a wand or prod that delivers a high voltage but low current electric shock to a torture victim.
Laura Giordani (1964, Córdoba, Argentina)
Because of the Argentine military dictatorship, in the late 1970s she went into exile with her family in Spain, where she has lived almost half her life.
She studied Psychology, Fine Arts and English language.
She participates in writers´meetings and gives poetic recitals in Argentina and Spain.
She has written the following poetry collections: Apurando la copa (2001), Celebración del brote (2003), Cartografía de lo blando (2005), Noche sin clausura (2006), Sudestada (2009), Materia oscura (2010) and Antes de desaparecer (2016).
Her poems have been included in several anthologies, she has also collaborated in journals from Argentina, Brazil, Germany and Spain.
The following link reviews her latest work Antes de desaparecer ( Before disappearing) from which the above poems are extracts http://www.tendencias21.net/Antes-de-desaparecer–de-Laura-Giordani-una-manera-de-ampararse_a32021.html
Amparo Arróspide (Argentina) has published five poetry collections: Presencia en el Misterio, Mosaicos bajo la hiedra, Alucinación en dos actos y algunos poemas, Pañuelos de usar y tirar and En el oído del viento, as well as poems, short stories and articles on literature and films in anthologies and international magazines. She has translated authors such as Francisca Aguirre, Javier Díaz Gil, Luis Fores and José Antonio Pamies into English, together with Robin Ouzman Hislop, who she worked with for a period as co-editor of Poetry Life and Times,at Artvilla.com a Webzine. Her translations into Spanish of Margaret Atwood (Morning in the Burned House), James Stephens (Irish Fairy Tales) and Mia Couto (Vinte e Zinco) are in the course of being published, as well as her two poetry collections Hormigas en diáspora and Jacuzzi. She takes part in festivals, recently Transforming with Poetry (Leeds) and Centro de Poesía José Hierro (Getafe).
https://www.facebook.com/PoetryLifeTimes
https://www.twitter.com/PoetryLifeTimes
Robin Ouzman Hislop is Editor of Poetry Life and Times ; at Artvilla.com his publications include
All the Babble of the Souk , Cartoon Molecules and Next Arrivals, collected poems, and the recently published Moon Selected Audio Textual Poems, as well as translation of Guadalupe Grande´s La llave de niebla, as Key of Mist and the recently published Tesserae , a translation
of Carmen Crespo´s Teselas.
You may visit Aquillrelle.com/Author Robin Ouzman Hislop about author. See Robin performing his work Performance (University of Leeds)
Poem by EVA MARÍA CHINCHILLA on a homage supplement published in “Cuadernos del Matemático” Nº 56-58, dedicated to Leonard Cohen,Translated from Spanish by Robin Ouzman Hislop & Amparo Arróspide
-
We are the lesser who will never be able to write
a good love poem than those of us who will never
be able to write a love poem in time.
I love your temperature. That’s what I love,
not you
Gentle, gallant, it keeps the milky warmth of a blade of wheat
offering itself at dawn
breaking earlier than myself, heralding
— from its delta-
the descent of dreams
I love your eyes. For their sea, for their fairy
for their
id
and whilst each time i shatter the image of blue cliches
you invade that which has no colour, each time leaving it within
that which i’ll never
discover
not you
I love your caligraphy. Remains of eternity, my inheritance
that you pretend as yet yours
voice that sweetly swathes me
and tungsten. Impossible firefly, there
I love your caligraphy because it cleanses each time the wound of having thought i knew you
(and the treasure of the hidden note in the third stanza, when id
shipwrecks
where we read
because it cleanses each time the wound of having thought i knew you
to read again now
because it gently opens the wound whether i knew
how to love
despite not knowing
I love your caligraphy because it lets me recognise you
a balm which you prepare for me, it says
to recognise has been to know
so
there exists the possibility that i have
you, that´s what your caligraphy says, it says my
my love for you
that i have not yet known,
it extends before my eyes and on my skin bares – a code so familiar as to be indeciph–
sunsets and a bond of views without other qualification than their
certainty
this breeze that rustles my skin, carouses my blood, tempers
and forgives me
me, you, me
-
Somos menos quienes nunca lograremos escribir
un buen poema de amor que quienes nunca
lograremos escribir a tiempo un poema de amor
Amo tu temperatura. Es lo que amo,
y no a ti
Suave, donosa, guarda el calor lácteo de la espiga. Se entrega de madrugada, antes
que yo amanece y anuncia
–desde su delta—
la bajada de los sueños
Amo tus ojos. Por su mar, por su hada
por su
id
y mientras yo destrozo cada vez la pantalla de los tópicos
del azul, invades lo que no tiene color, lo dejas dentro cada vez jamás
encontraré
no a ti
Amo tu caligrafía. Restos de eternidad, herencia mía
que simulas tuya aún
voz de tela que me arropa
y wolframio. Luciérnaga imposible, ahí
amo tu caligrafía, porque desinfecta, cada vez, la herida de haber creído conocerte
(y la nota del tesoro escondido de la tercera estrofa, cuando naufrague
id
donde hemos leído
porque desinfecta, cada vez, la herida de haber creído conocerte
para ahora leer
porque abre con suavidad la herida de si supe amar
lo que conocía
a pesar de no sabr que lo
amo tu caligrafía porque me deja reconocerte
un bálsamo que tú preparas para mí, dice
reconocer ha sido conocer
entonces
existe la posibilidad de que te haya
a ti eso dice tu caligrafía, dice mi
te amo a ti
que yo no he sabido saber,
extiende ante mis ojos y en mi piel expone –en un código tan familiar como indesci—
amaneceres y miradas en unidad, sin otro calificativo que el de
indudables
esa brisa se extiende por mi piel, navega por mi sangre, me templa
y me perdona
a mí, a ti, a mí
Eva Chinchilla, evachin. Poet. Author of Años Abisinios (2011), Verbo rea (2003), and a third poetry book currently in production. Participant in anthologies such as La noche y sus etcéteras. 24 voces alrededor de San Juan de la Cruz (2017), Hilanderas (2006) o Estruendomudo (2003). She is also a board member of poetry magazine Nayagua, which is a publication by the José Hierro Poetry Foundation, where she was a teacher from 2007 to 2016. Member of the Genialogías Association and the 8que80 collective of female poets; co-editor of Diminutos Salvamentos poetry collection. She walks along the haiku and flamenco lyrics paths. A philologist (hispanist), with a degree free master in continuous training and questioning. Born in Madrid (1971).
Eva Chinchilla, evachin. Poeta. Autora de Años abisinios (2011), Verbo rea (2003), y un tercer poemario en prensa; incluida en antologías como La noche y sus etcéteras. 24 voces alrededor de San Juan dela Cruz (2017), Hilanderas (2006) o Estruendomudo (2003). Forma parte del consejo de la revista de poesía Nayagua, que se edita desde la Fundación Centro de Poesía José Hierro de Getafe, donde fue profesora desde 2007 hasta 2016. Integrante de la Asociación Genialogías y el colectivo 8que80 de mujeres poetas; coeditora de la colección diminutos salvamentos; andariega del camino del haiku y de las letrillas flamencas. Filóloga (hispanista), con master sin titulación en formación y cuestionamiento continuos. Nació en Madrid (1971).
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Robin Ouzman Hislop is Editor of Poetry Life and Times ; at Artvilla.com his publications include
All the Babble of the Souk , Cartoon Molecules and Next Arrivals, collected poems, and the recently published Moon Selected Audio Textual Poems, as well as translation of Guadalupe Grande´s La llave de niebla, as Key of Mist and the recently published Tesserae , a translation
of Carmen Crespo´s Teselas.
You may visit Aquillrelle.com/Author Robin Ouzman Hislop about author. See Robin performing his work Performance (University of Leeds)
Reducto Anagramatico Sunday Afternoon 1915 Wallace Stevens. Poem Excerpt from Moon Selected Audio Textual Poems by Robin Ouzman Hislop
http://www.aquillrelle.com/authorrobin.htm
reducto anagramatico sunday afternoon 1915 wallace stevens
come give balm to the gusty grieving
nights to hush day green the seas
for her dark oranges bloom an
indifferent inhuman evening
of cherished comfort and wings
like wide complacencies
but next moves in mythy gat motions
among any hind’s heaven or paradise
& cries cause the sun’s littering
our afterwards river sky relinquish
the mountains and whistle in her porch
death still the imperishable inescapable
for receding boughs to wear sleeplessly
the sun colours to hang of sky bosom
serafin plum the perfect rivers the hills
the lay sky paths that live impassioned
upon grass phrases in extended cries over
her peignoir and coffee upon blood calm
Robin Ouzman Hislop is on line Editor at Poetry Life & Times at Artvilla.com. His numerous appearances include Cold Mountain Review (Appalachian University, N.Carolina), The Honest Ulsterman, Cratera No 3 and Aquillrelle’s Best. His publications are collected poems All the Babble of the Souk, Cartoon Molecules, Next Arrivals & Moon Selected Audio Textual Poems and translations from Spanish of poems by Guadalupe Grande Key of Mist and Carmen Crespo Tesserae (the award winning XIII Premio César Simón De Poesía). In November 2017 these works were presented in a live performance at The International Writer’s Conference hosted by the University of Leeds, UK. A forthcoming publication of collected poems Off the Menu is expected in 2020.
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Robin Ouzman Hislop is Editor of Poetry Life and Times at Artvilla.com . You may visit Aquillrelle.com/Author Robin Ouzman Hislop about author. See Robin performing his
work Performance (University of Leeds)
Somewhere Over. An Audio Textual Poem by Robin Ouzman Hislop
Oh when the saints tread tenderly flora & foliage are abundant so the pain with bird song is not seen with the lessening of in my eyes human traffic bury me here go marching in & laugh in the face of the wind & come back next year bring me the face somewhere over the rainbow when will we return? of the grateful dead i wanna be & i will sow skies are blue the flora of tomorrow will the deserts be green again amongst that number as when homo erectus trecked through them? once in a lullaby what did they seek freedom? before confusion & the babble of tongues when the saints go marching in
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Robin Ouzman Hislop is Editor of Poetry Life and Times at Artvilla.com . You may visit Aquillrelle.com/Author Robin Ouzman Hislop about author. See Robin performing his work Performance (University of Leeds)
Episodes. An Audio Textual Poem by Robin Ouzman Hislop
episodes however brief virus in the slaughterhouses obedience to the state or there is fragmentation a world of fragmentation is not of epiphanies but epitaphs they tell us surrounded by hegemony that camouflages our right of way we multiply in the expectancy to gain the wealth of the world it is our sadness as we grow old the fear we cannot care for each other this is what the walk of life has led us to misunderstanding the unknowable unknowables the something and the nothing noths helpless as leaves upon a tree we struggle on in our suffering as so many millions upon millions have done must do in silence & stoicism remembering lost friends & relatives without blame for we cannot enter their minds i had had a surprising dream about death i figured but so personal i didn't want to speak about it to anyone in case i might make it happen early morning mist rain thunder rolls on the blue mountains this really is the kingdom of exile where we play with words the silent absent words yet embedded in every action even as we think before we speak words that tell truth & falsehood are fragments episodes however brief
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Robin Ouzman Hislop is Editor of Poetry Life and Times at Artvilla.com . You may visit Aquillrelle.com/Author Robin Ouzman Hislop about author. See Robin performing his work Performance (University of Leeds)
go go go
there’s no grail in the grainy day
i’m so tired of stirring glue
one more time lady of the night
go go go i’m outta sight
power plays with psychopathy
what’s left of words our pathology
i took my baby down to MeJico
the place you know you go go go
i’m so tired of stirring glue
& tomorrow’s just another shoe
where there’s no lack for being strange
where the world’s already twisted & maimed
one more time lady of the night
what’s gonna make it through & through
we’ll all be dead at the sight of you
go go go i’m outta sight
we’re pathologically psychotic
you can put it got it got it
our words blasted in the thunder
& tomorrow’s rainbow’s no penumbra
where psychopathy plays the one number
kick arse this world so full of shite
come on down lady of the night
go go go i’m outta of sight
i’m so tired of stirrring glue
we’ll all be dead at the sight of you
holocaust plague & famine too
the map’s rotting over the ruins
words turn to bones in their tombings
like waxwork effigies we melt in the blue
i’m going down to MeJico
you know the place you go go go
come on down lady of the night
i’m gonnna dance with you outta sight
we’re on a wave that’s gonna disappear
a field that evaporates in thin air
then suddenly again you’re standing there
dancing with time forever there
come on down lady of the night
i’m gonna dance with you outta sight
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Robin Ouzman Hislop is Editor of Poetry Life and Times at Artvilla.com . You may visit Aquillrelle.com/Author Robin Ouzman Hislop about author. See Robin performing his work Performance (University of Leeds)