by Fríða Ísberg

mom is turning into
an unanswered phone call

here are my limits
she says and chalks
a circle around herself

her embrace, once hot
now hardens

still, cinders slip
into her mail slot

often,
as if in tow

as if she herself bears the torch
that burns the bridge behind her 

mom barks into the phone
like a chained dog
forbidden from moving closer

and when she does
she wants nothing but to comb
your hair, hold your hand 

braid her long fingers
with your short ones 

she asks you to sing her song
howls it out of an open car window

laughs: we‘re not in tune

and she‘s right
you’re off-key

you can’t grow up fast enough
she can’t calm herself down

Translated by Fríða Ísberg and Meg Matich.
Originally appeared in EuropeNow journal.

by Fríða Ísberg

They’ve persisted
in watering me
for years

placed me on the window sill
stored me there

forgot me there

but it’s fine:
add fuel to the flames

it’s fine:
a woman is the pyre

Translated by Fríða Ísberg and Meg Matich.
Originally appeared in EuropeNow journal.

by Fríða Ísberg

wet paper
tangled in birch branches 

inside the window, smoking,
a woman with red hair

says to herself:
they can’t hear me anymore

irises
slip into the white
like burst egg yolks

the living room is heavy

on the carpet,
fragile things, scattered,

soaked in bile

she wraps them
cautiously
in old newspapers

and shoves them back
down her throat

Translated by Fríða Ísberg and Meg Matich.
Originally appeared in EuropeNow journal.

by Bragi Ólafsson

Undirdjúpin
The Deep

A ship sails from land.
It moves away like people drift
apart: it becomes smaller
than it was

when it lay in the harbour,
and smaller and smaller still
as the harbour expands
and the sky narrows in.

So little has it become
when it meets the horizon
that if it ever had any hope
that battle is lost — and it sinks

Translated by K. B. Thors.
Originally appeared in, Circumference, Poetry in Translation.