Poets Translate Poets: A Hudson Review Anthology (27 page)

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on the threshold can descry

the stilled millstone, hoes long used to the grip of rural hands:

the rustic shade ferments with ancestral longings.

Rockroses, thistles, pulicaria, calaminths—scents

that seem fresh and aromatic, are

(should your wariness pall) the lures

of a spiral that winds-in all,

(night bites into silver

free of all alloy of sidereal ray) she will

besmirch with dust even the curve of the gentle hill.

Now, she’s in day, one hand against an oak,

the other hangs loose—fi lthy and coaxing,

her dress black as a fl ue-brush . . .

and the sudden rush of wind

over the headland, sets at large, lets fl ow

in a fl ood a divine

tangle of leaves and fl ourishing bough.

Th

e heat, too, promises, discloses

freshness, vigour of the breath that lets free

peach and the bitter-sweet

odour of the fl owering almond tree; under coarse leaf

are fl eshy and violent mouths, wild off shoots,

between the ferns’ long fans

obscure hints of mushroom growths,

uncertain glances of water glint through the clovers,

and a sense of bare

original clay is there

near where the poplar wakes unslakeable thirst

with its rustling mirages of streams

and makes itself a mirror of each breeze,

where, in the hill’s shade,

steep sloping,

the valley grows

narrow and closes

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I ta l i a n

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in the mouth of a spring

among delicate mosses.

If, for a moment,

cloud comes to rest

over the hill-crest or the valley threshold,

in the living shade

the shaft of that plough now shows

which shakes which unfl owers unleafs

the bush and the forest rose.

Th

e Night

Sometimes the night turns gentle;

if it can raise from the obscure ring

of mountains a breath of freshness

to bring suff ocation to an end, from the walls nearby

it releases a cluster of songs, it rises

with the creepers through the long arches, on the high

terraces, on the great pergolas,

in the openwork of the unstill branches, it reveals

carnations of gold, it gathers

faint secrets from the threads of water on the gravel beds

or moves tired steps

where the dark waves smash against breakwaters of white.

Suddenly on the screen of dreams

it blows into living veins faces already ash, words

that are voiceless . . . sets spinning the girandole of shadows:

on the threshold, above, all around

a vain emptiness, a vast passageway sways into forms,

a moving glance seizes

and a glance that stops cancels them.

Reverberations of echoes, shatterings, insatiate memories,

re-fl ux of lived-out life that gushes over

Luc io Pic c ol o
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from the urn of Time, the hostile waterclock

that breaks into pieces; it is a mouth of air

that furiously feels for a kiss,

a hand of wind that wishes for a caress.

On the stone fl ights, on the step of slate,

at the door that is splitting with dryness,

the quiet oil is the sole light;

little by little, the rigour of the sung verses

spent, the dark is more dense—it seems like rest

but it is fever; the shadow hangs from the secret

beating of an immense

Heart

of

fi re.

Landscape

From Anna Perenna

Above the roof

ascends, impends all at once

the mountain—to the left , encumbered

with a thorny green on green, with coulters

of a shed leafage, agèd tree-rinds, brush:

and caper, euphorbia hang at the winds’

mercy; where the coastline bends

and summons the shadow in, spreading it across

the scape of wrinklings, at the slope’s

summit, folds fall open: valleys

of thicker green, there you can seek

and fi nd puffb

all, buttercup and wild leek:

on dense leaf, on creeping bronchia

scum, wood spit, dark dew

of the swollen stalk, the thorn, the goitered

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and oozing stem, that which remains

clammy with rainbow-coloured stains, which never sees

sunlight (and assiduously the invisible shuttles

weave, mutate, but the cycle will stay

the same forever) fed with an ancient moisture,

a mildew of vegetation . . .

and perhaps an eyeless lizard slides away . . .

Charles Tomlinson, 1967

Luc io Pic c ol o
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J a pa n e s e

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K a k inomoto no Hitom a ro
(ca. 660–708)

Ode at the Time of the Temporary Interment of Princess Asuka at Kinoe

Th

ey have raised you a bridge of stone

in the upper shoals of Asuka.

Th

e birds glance on the water.

Th

ey have built you a bridge of wood

in the lower shoals of Asuka.

And the weeds that spring from the stone

are cut but grow again.

And the grass that grows on the wood

is withered but grows again.

But you, my princess, why have you

gone from the evening palace,

gone from the morning halls

of your lovely lord

on whom you leaned

when you lay together

as the river reed leans on the wave?

Like tall grass I see you standing.

I see you still with the living,

in spring with fl owers,

with leaves for fall.

Deep as one looks in a mirror

you looked on your lord,

and were not full, fi nding him

more and more marvelous

like the fi ft h-month moon.

You locked your sleeves to his,

and time upon time together

you went with your lord

to the shrine of Kinoë,

bearing in cups the holy wine.

K a k i nomo t o no H i t om a ro
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And now Kinoë is your shrine.

I see you still with the living,

and all my words are unwoven.

Th

e duck-wild eyes die away.

Oh, when I see your lord

who goes on loving alone

like a mandarin drake,

who comes and goes

like the bird of morning,

bent down with longing,

as summer grass is bent,

rising here, setting there,

like the evening star,

and his wild heart tossed

like a little shallop,

what could I say,

what should I know?

Th

ere is only the sound and the name.

Th

ese are endless, like heaven and earth.

We shall go to the stream of Asuka,

the river that runs with your name,

and adore for ten thousand years

our loveliest princess.

A Naga-uta on the Death of His Wife

Th

ere on the road to Karu

(Karu, called for the mallards),

my love, my sister, lived

and I desired to see her.

But too many eyes

and eyes too curious

forbade my coming.

For still our love was secret,

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and the ways of love were hidden

like a fountain in the rocks

or a little fl ame in fl int.

And now the fl ame is out,

for she I loved is gone,

who leaned sleeping against me

as the seaweed leans on the wave,

gone like splendid October,

a ripeness from the days.

Th

is is the news the runner brings,

news like the twang of the yew-wood bow.

I hear the words, but cannot speak,

nor comfort fi nd, nor rest,

nor hope, nor endure such words.

So I go the road to Karu

where she watched for my coming.

I go the road and listen,

straining for a voice,

but hear only the wild geese

screaming over Unebi,

and the people that throng

the spear of the road.

I meet them and scan their faces,

but see no face like hers.

For this is left of love:

to cry her name

to wave my sleeve.

Falling on hillpaths

the red leaves cloud the way.

I seek my love who wanders.

I cannot fi nd the path,

and the mountain is unknown.

K a k i nomo t o no H i t om a ro
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Th

rough the ruddy fall,

the red leaves falling on,

I see the runner still.

I see a meeting-day

although we meet no more.

Grief aft er the Mountain-Crossing of the Prince

Th

e haze rises. Th

e spring evening is woven.

And I am lost. I have no way. I have no words:

ingrown in grief, dumb like the nightjar.

Could I tongue my grief, loosen the sleeves of speech!

O the wind that blew up at the mountain-crossing of our great lord

blows, and blows back, evening and morning, lapping my sleeves!

And I am lost, like a man undone, going a journey

but going in grass, without words, and the way lost,

and a grief in my guts

like the salt-burning of the fi sher-girls of Tsumu.

William Arrowsmith, 1955

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Motom a ro Senge
(1888–1948)

Tangerines, My Boy, and Me

My boy went and got two tangerines.

He gave one to me

and is peeling the other for himself.

Wordlessly we sit across from each other, hibachi between us.

I look at the tangerine in my hand.

I am startled at its beauty.

A beauty that is uncanny.

Beautiful no matter where I put it.

I put it on the desk and look at it;

I put it in the palm of my hand and look.

I am coupled with the fruit wherever I set it.

It’s as beautiful as if plucked this instant from an unseen bough.

Shining and fading into darkness,

the lamplight in the impenetrable night is incomplete,

nothing more than a childish trick.

I furtively steal a glance at my boy.

Head down, he is silently peeling his tangerine,

all thumbs.

I see a tangerine peeping out from inside his kimono.

It’s as though I’ve discovered the secret of a magic trick.

I’ll bet he’s got a lot of them!

Th

e Soy Mash Vendor

Th

e soy mash vendor,

baby tied to her back,

goes through the predawn city streets

singing like a bird,

marvelously fast of foot,

asking for orders here, then there,

and greets all with good cheer,

Mo t om a ro Se ng e
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wending her way from neighborhood to neighborhood,

cleansing the air as she goes.

Quick as a bird

and as elusive,

she fl its along singing;

I love that voice.

I love the sight of her.

Lawrence Rogers, 2009

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L a t i n

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Lucr etius
(ca. 99 b.c.–55 b.c.)

From
Th

e Nature of Th

ings

From Book 1, Against the Evils of Religion

One thing I am concerned about: you might, as you commence

Philosophy, decide you see impiety therein,

And that the path you enter is the avenue to sin.

More oft en, on the contrary, it is
Religion
breeds