Totul poate fi redus pânã la urmã la o idee
când, mergând pe stradã, despici lumea in douã cu pieptul
si înzemosata si nepãtrunsa lume
îti pare acum mai degrabã o bucatã tare de brânzã
pe care o tai ca s-o mesteci mai usor
esti tu însuti o idee
care merge pe stradã deghizatã în om.
Te sucesti în stanga si-n dreapta cu tot corpul, ca lupul,
despici pâna si aerul cu coatele
si în mijlocul mintii tale e ochiul fix al mortii
si multe multe sertãrase,
toate asezate douã câte douã
bine rãu frumos urât
Masinãria binarã de fãcut sens
ticãie adânc în vene
si metalul ei rece ia încet locul sângelui tãu.
Sã mã apuc sã fac o poezie sau o plãcinta cu dovleac?
Înainte as fi ales poezia.
Astãzi poezia este în dovleac.
Asta face în fiecare zi: stã in dovleac
sau în tufele de pe drumul spre garã
chiar si în lãpticul de searã
leneveste. Musteste. Dã pe dinafara
ca sã se întoarca înãuntru
în asa fel încât, în surzenia, în orbirea mea,
sã pot totusi asculta ceea ce urechile nu aud
sã pot totusi vedea ceea ce ochii mei nu vãd.
Azi poezia nu poate fi deosebitã de plãcinta cu dovleac.
E o stare nediferentiatã care ar putea fi rezumatã
la faptul ca într-o dupã amiazã o gânganie mi se plimba pe picior.
Dupa ce mor o sã am timp berechet de asemenea prostii
cum ar fi aceea de a transcrie bãnuitele, întâmplatele poezii.
Acest domn stã la o masã si scrie.
Eu vin tiptil pe la spate
si privesc peste umãrul lui.
Vã fac semne, mã strâmb, voi râdeti.
Domnul se încruntã, roseste, începe sã vã citeascã poezia
si nu observã
cum îi pun un gândac în barbã.
Domnul suferã în poezia lui,
Cade si se ridicã,
moare si învie,
fred si barni.
În acest timp gândacul meu urcã.
Domnul e un bulgare de foc,
sã-i facem injectii,
sã-l scãrpinãm putin pe picior.
Publicul priveste cutremurat aventura gândacului
ajuns pe gurã.
Deodatã domnul îsi înfinge cutitul în inimã,
îl scoate si vã aratã sângele.
Voi râdeti: gândacul a pãtruns în poezie,
drãgutul de el,
se miscã printre cuvinte si lasã o dârã verde.
Domnul strigã: poezia mea!. . .
dar n-o mai vrea,
n-o mai vrea dupã gândac.
Eu înaintez din penumbrã si culeg aplauzele.
Everything could ultimately be reduced to an idea,
you figure, walking down the street,
parting the world in halves with your chest.
The juicy, impenetrable world
seems rather a hard piece of cheese
you cut into pieces in order to chew on it easier.
You yourself are an idea
disguised as a man on the street.
You turn left and right like a wolf
with your whole body,
parting the air with your elbows.
In the back of your mind, you carry
death’s fixed eye
and many, many little drawers
sorted in rows, two-by-two:
good, evil, beautiful, ugly.
The binary machine of making sense
ticks deep into your veins,
its cold metal slowly replacing your blood.
Should I write a poem or bake a pumpkin pie?
A while ago, I would have chosen the poem.
Today, the poem is in the pumpkin.
That’s what it does: it just sits there, in the pumpkin,
waits in the roadside bushes on the way to the train station,
or idles in evening’s milk.
It oozes. It overflows,
then turns back inside me,
so that, deaf and blind,
I can hear what my ears can’t hear,
I can see what my eyes can’t see.
Today, there is no difference between my poem
and the pumpkin pie.
It’s an undefined state, best described
by a bug climbing my leg on a lazy afternoon.
When I’ll be dead,
I’ll have plenty of time
for such foolish play transcribing
chance encounters with rhyme.
This gentleman sits at the table and writes.
I tiptoe behind him
and watch over his shoulder.
I gesture to you, make faces, you laugh.
The man frowns, blushes, starts reading his poem
and doesn’t notice I drop
a cockroach in his beard.
In his poem, the man suffers,
falls and gets up,
dies and resurrects—
tom and jerry.
Meanwhile, my cockroach climbs.
The man is a ball of fire,
let’s give him a shot,
let’s scratch his leg a little.
Terrified, the public watches the adventure of the cockroach
that has made it as far as the man’s mouth.
Suddenly, the man stabs a knife into his heart,
pulls it out, and shows you the blood.
You laugh: the cockroach got into the poem,
sweet little thing,
it moves around the words leaving a green trace.
The man yells: my poem!...
but he doesn’t want it anymore,
now that the roach got inside.
I step forward from the semi-shadow
and reap the applause.
Selections from Beautybeast (North Shore Press, 2012)
Translated from the Romanian by Claudia Serea
Claudia Serea: There is always a degree of unfaithfulness in translation, no matter how hard the translator tries to make the translation tight. The ultimate goal is to produce a poem that sounds as if it were written in English in the first place. Some poems are easy to translate, as if they were meant to be. Others are more challenging. There can be all sorts of difficulties: ambiguity of meaning, use of wordplay, puns, humor, rhyme, or the syntax complicated by inversions. Translation is a negotiation process through all these challenges, with the understanding, both by the translator and the original poet, that some things will be lost, and others found (usually just by chance). I find the rhyme most difficult to keep. It's possible to replace it with half-rhymes, but it's not an exact fit. Other times, ambiguity gets in the way because English is such a precise language. I don’t think it’s the translator’s job to clarify the author’s intentions, although I certainly ask if I have questions. It’s up to the reader to interpret, pause, re-read, and enjoy all the possibilities a poem has to offer. The best way to deal with the challenges is to let the poem sit for a few days and come back to it with fresh eyes. I read it again without comparing it to the original. Does it stand on its own? As long as the spirit, life, and playfulness of the original poem are captured, I’d consider it a successful translation.