Tuesday, 16 April 2013

NaPoWriMo day 16



NaPoWriMo day 16 and time for some silliness - a fake ‘translation’ of a poem written in an unfamiliar language… given my Viking tendencies, I’ve gone for the Icelandic-language Skagafjörður by Gerður Kristný. Here's the original (published in 2007 by Mál og menning, Reykjavik and found in the collection Höggstaður):

Ég reyni að vera
alúðleg við börnin
svo þau hirði um leiðið mitt
þegar þar að kemur
mylji köku ofan í grasið
á afmælinu mínu
og fari með ljóðið um
fingruðu kýrnar
þá sjálf orðin gömul og grá

Samt á ég eftir að
þekkja þau aftur
á himneskri húsalyktinni

alltaf skulu þau ilma eins og Jesúbarnið

Now for my faux-translated version, with all due apologies to the original author…

Eggs rain down on Vera,
All addled with burning,
So they hurt without a leather mitt,
They go over there in the corner,
Thousands cooked in the oven, it’s greasy,
An unappealing menu,
This fare I’m loathing, I am,
Fingering the corner,
That shall forthwith go mouldy and grey.

Something with egg after all,
Thicker though after
A heinous creep has licked the tin.

All tough-skulled, though ill from one egg, yes you’re barmy.

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