Yearning
by Magda Portal (Peru)
translated by Kathleen Weaver
Unfurl for me oh God the far horizons
shake light into the oceans and the winds
I am cast down as if pressed
between dark and silence.
I no longer yearn to be moss or ivy
wing light–boned wing is all I am
escaping snaring chains eluding
sorrow’s weight on my frail shoulders.
Naked I walked stripped
the more naked the more free
of that pain by which I knew
that I am one who loves —
I love and expect nothing in return.
My blood irrigates the earth
lifting from each furrow dying then reborn
bearing my lamp across the world.
Let no one see the wound piercing my side
or my hands mauled by wild animals
As long as my heart recalls its song
I’ll go on scattering my star.
Reflections of a Minister of State
by Ernesto Cardenal (Nicaragua)
translated by Margaret Randall
What can I do? I am the Minister of Culture
and must attend a reception in such and such an embassy.
Which one? It doesn’t matter.
One or another, they’re all the same.
And suddenly in the bush, by the ditch,
a cat.
The car’s two lights illuminate the two on the cat.
I’d like to stay here
keep observing this cat,
what color it is,
(at night, as the saying goes, everything is the same color)
what it will do next, how it
will move its shoulders.
To stay by the ditch with the cat
my cat
would be great
although I would be imitating Marianne Moore
— for example, that cat of hers with a mouse in its mouth
its tail hanging from it like a shoelace — ,
Davenport says of Marianne Moore:
“She is more interested in the ostrich
than the ornithologist
who wrote the entry for Ostrich
in the Encyclopedia Britannica.”
I continue to think about the cat and Marianne Moore.
And then no more:
I’ve entered the well–lit embassy now
and greet His Excellency the Ambassador.
Issue Release Party in New York City
Join our very own Stave Luttrell in New York City for an issue release party November 6 at Tomkins Square library!
Chen Xiaoyuan
Chen Xiaoyuan: is a translator and lecturer at Sichuan Normal University. She has worked as a translator of poetry and prose for the past 15 years. Key translations include Mark William Roche’s Why Choose the Liberal Arts?, Bradley Nelson’s The Emotion Code, and Start Here by Betsy Wheeler. She is Co-founder of Yanlu Arts and Culture in Chengdu, where she lives and works.