Rhyme is boring to me
I want to observe the movement of words
So that my thought can trail after them
Music has flowed selfpersonedly
I’m precursor to the movement of life
People do not hinder me
I look through my fingers
They show themselves always
As it pleases me.
Rhyme used to bore me
A totally different music
There was merrier and more senseless
I also want to utter something
No one ever heard
The tongue will create it first
I’ll shut up for a bit to trail once more
To trail once more the words of another
Lose my mind
No
Must stand up stand on
One leg
Maybe then I’ll grasp the mysteries
Altogether.
Author notes
I do not really understand what you want for your "Fine Frenzy" competition.
But if it is about the poetic process - then I think this might fit. It is a translation of a poem by the Ukrainian Futurist poet Mykhaylo Semenko (1892-1937)
As you will see from his date of death (or rather murder - at the hands of Stalin's secret police), his work is now out of copyright.
A contest entry
- Winklings Celebrates its 100th Contest (A Series) - Contest K by Lyndon.
6000 points, ended August 13, 2008, 12 entries
Bronze trophy winner
• next poem in this contest, remove from contest
Please do not feel obliged to comment - and if you DO comment, please understand that it may be some time before I respond.
Comments
1 - 11 of 11
-
nice write . . liked "I want to observe the movement of words" and "I look through my fingers" . . congrats on the trophy
-
Done with your usual aplomb and artistry! Congratulations on the Bronze!
-
Very much a display of process...
when so much can crowd and clamour for
the chance to be expressed. I feel it
fits the prompt very well. Blue -
Semenko's vision showed a love for poetry
I do not know history that well, and I can only tell how this poem makes me feel.
I can see that Semenko had a thirst for modern ideas in poetry at a time when this was probably against the traditional. I presume this is soon after the revolution and a move in early twentieth century towards more liberal writings in poetry. It seems to me,to be a Ukrainian dream against the ties of Russian conservatism in art.
I can see the search in the poem for the thirst for knowledge and the power of words in art as he may "grasp the mysteries altogether." He seems in pursuit of the essence of modern writing, in the emotion of words and the creation of modern thoughts through poetry.
A wonderful expression of poetic thoughts in this translation.
-
-
I cannot for the moment recall the date of this particular poem - but have the feeling that it dates from around 1920. Semenko was one of the founders of the futurist movement in Ukraine (he published his first, innovative collection in 1913), and his work was prominently featured in the recent exhibition at the British Library on European Avant-Garde Publishing 1900-1937.
("Brewing-up" was one of the six Semenko poems I was asked to translate in connection with the "gallery lectures" given in connection with the exhibition).
-
-
Brewing up contentiousness
in Stalin's Russia. Not the done thing! No rhyme nor reason; simply, not the done thing! Thoughts must not trail after any movement including the movement of words!!
"Selfpersonedly" is an un-Soviet-Statehood word, most definitely. And to look through one's fingers ... no!
And what mysteries! Solzhenitsyn would know them first hand.
"This is a defiant poem; a poem that I should imagine that it takes one Ukrainian to understand fully the other. Bravo. Ron.
-
-
Thank you for your appreciation...
Please note, however, Semenko was NOT a Russian, he was a Ukrainian! And to call a Ukrainian a Russian is like - well, calling a Scot an Englishman!
Apart from that - well, my work as a translator of Ukrainian poetry does, I hope, do something to make the Ukrainian psyche a little more comprehensible to the rest of the world.
-
-
Attended to!
I should have known!
-
-
-
Amazing. People grasp the mysteries of life in many ways, and it is not always through words. I particularly like the title, which might appear at first to be something to do with beer; but signifies the approaching storm instead. By the way, I forwarded my Two Sisters sonnets to you. Take care. K.
-
ahhh, thank you for the notes added helpful background an aid to understanding, the poem has many fascinating ideas and aspects; one imagines earlier times and an inability to speak openly, words might take on symbolic significance...wonderful poem and very expressive brought so very well in translation...PK
-
I think we lost an interesting poet, and individualist, and a creative mind in 1937 - and I am going by the evidence of one poem!
Adding your comment:
1 - 11 of 11
