Translation Poem by Sofiul Azam

Translation



for Daniel Thomas Moran

Time and time again I've said I'm not content
with one thread to make a lusterless dress,
and I need lots of them dyed in colors.
With labor, I've made a fine but single thread
to be knitted into others. I'm embarrassingly
flawed without other threads - other languages.
Hard-pressed and suffocating, I feel the sap
of my desire drying out. Water me and you'll
see me rewarding you with cotton-balls
for your thread. The sooner the better.
Translate me into your voice, which supports
the matching of your space with your time.
I'm not in the least scared of what the dead
warned I might lose in translation. Spread
whatever I say across continents and make me
your overhanging sky. Without you, I'll be
a sack of seeds not taken out to sprout.
Translate me into winged seeds if you can.
Your language is a key. Open the cell for me.
Let me gain whatever I can out of freedom -
the other name of which is translation.
You can translate me into rain on a place
where the season of drought seems to be endless
for dams being not a river's bracelets but shackles.
Translate me into peace on all your killing fields
or into anything to get the air of relaxation,
to drive snowflakes to let the summer in.


from SAFE UNDER WATER (2014)

Friday, July 22, 2016
Topic(s) of this poem: translation
COMMENTS OF THE POEM
READ THIS POEM IN OTHER LANGUAGES
Close
Error Success