I am in Iowa City this week for a translation pedagogy workshop. We spent most of today with Mark Hauber, who runs the Poetry Inside Out program through the Center for the Art of Translation (https://www.catranslation.org/).
We worked with a poem by Nazim Hikmet. Starting in pairs, we developed a phrase by phrase translation using a glossary that had been provided. Then we were supposed to collaborate with a second pair to create a "Make It Flow" version. We had a Turkish speaker in our larger group, so we deferred to her expertise for our final, group-approved version. But I took a big swing that I got to read aloud as well:
Today, Sunday
Today is Sunday, the first day.
Today, for the first time, I was brought into the sun.
And for the first time in my life, sky had begun.
So far away from me
So fucking blue
So wide I was amazed at what I viewed
Stopped in my tracks,
I sat with reverence on the solid ground,
Resting my back against a wall I found.
For a moment, the waves made no sound.
No struggle, no freedom, no wife--unbound.
Only the earth, the sun, and myself.
Lucky me.
