poem | TiaTalk

{Sat 17 February 2007} “The Shoe Hunt”: Translation of “Die Skoene Jag”

For those who asked… and some who might’ve been curious but didn’t ask… here’s a translation of the Afrikaans poem Die Skoene Jag which I posted on November 16th (I’ve noticed that this particular poem keeps registering hits, presumably because it’s a bit of a curiosity as an Afrikaans poem on an English website. On the other hand, some searchers are simply looking for shoes!)

This poem is also odd because it’s the only one of my childhood poems that currently appears on the site. I wrote it when I was thirteen, for a school exercise. Like all my peers in South Africa at the time, I was forced to study Afrikaans for the entire twelve years of my schooling. My own private rebellion against the Nationalist government consisted in refusing to speak Afrikaans, even though I wrote it well. I eventually managed to matriculate with an “A” for the subject overall, but something close to zero for the final oral exam, as I had not articulated a single sentence. It was a classic case of shooting oneself in the foot, of course, because in a later writers’ group where a few of the members had Afrikaans as a first language, I discovered that it is in fact an earthy tongue that richly and directly evokes emotion and conviction. As with all languages, there are some things that can only be said in that language and translation is inevitably “lossy”.

This translation is not a work of art (not that the original could really make a greater claim!) To convey it relatively accurately I’ve made a stab at using similar rhythms and rhyme-types as those in the original, but I did resort to some half-rhyme cheating, I confess. Most of the words are literally translated, although there are some word order inversions. The final line of the first stanza should really read something like “completed his appearance nicely”. The changes in tense are in the original, and were fairly typical in the telling of this kind of joke, as I remember.

The Shoe Hunt

Van der Merwe sees old Doep
Strolling out next to his stoep.
Old Doep wears a nice new suit
Like an ostrich with his plume.
A pretty shoe upon his foot
Finishes his fine costume.

“Hi, old pal! There on your foot
“Never a nicer shoe I’ve met!
“Tell me true, where did you
“Obtain such a lovely shoe?”
“You can’t buy it in a shop,”
Is the answer of old Doep.
“You must hunt it, if you will,
Simply shoot a crocodile.”

So every night, Van went down
To the river at full moon.
Every morning, back at the house
“Saw nothing, not even a mouse!”
Then he decided one last time
To search the stream for crocodile.

And this time, to his great luck,
Crocodile on the bank turned up.
Van der Merwe shoots the creature,
Goes into the water, pulls him over.
But now Van’s luck is really out:
“The stupid crocodile is barefoot!”

Tia Azulay 17Feb07
Copyright © 2007 Tia Azulay

{Thu 15 February 2007} Twilight Goodbye

Twilight Goodbye

There was such a wonderful sky tonight. Cocooned in your car, I could not conceive the coming parting. It came swift and unthought—a door opening and closing on a highway; the pull of traffic demanding your attention and drowning out our promises. But, as you disappeared, the suddenly unglazed freshness of the rose-hued sky swept into my senses. I reached up instinctively to embrace it, and it took hold of me instead, making my feet mercurial as I danced homeward, balanced on a godly whim. When I let the road turn me from those caressing clouds, it pointed me to a pure, bright moon, perfect, waiting for me under winter branches, anticipating the dusk. A cool thrill of joy tremored in my spirit and recalled your still, deep presence to me.

Tia Azulay 06Aug89-06Jul10
Copyright © 1989, 2011 Tia Azulay
For Anthony

{Wed 14 February 2007} My Valentine

My Valentine

His sweet angelic face,
Gentle hands and quiet pace
Calm me: I who lack his grace
Am whole in his embrace.

His speech is soft and wise;
Pure joy lights up his eyes
When he sets his magic free
Or sometimes just looks at me.

And when I curl inside,
He curves around his bride.
What a privilege to be
The one he longs to see.

Tia Azulay 14Feb07
Copyright © 2007 Tia Azulay

{Wed 14 February 2007} Time Travel

Time Travel

I climbed a long road to a seat in the cloud
Where I watched soft wings beat butterflygold
Across the valley.
Stirred, I sang out for the brush of their beauty:
Might their velvet powder melt merry with mercy
My frozen cheek?

They gambolled in glory, made love to the light,
Wove wandwarm with wonder their way within sight
Of my shady seat.
I longed for their dance, but my shadow held still,
Undefined in the cool, yet preserved in the pull
Of old destiny.

Now it seemed, from the shade, if the line of the sun
Would advance, yes, invade, then they too would come
And gentle me.
Yes! They surged, saviour-sweet, but spattered their dust!
Against Time’s transparent fear-fortress they crushed,
Oh! lavishly.

And sundials spun and seasons were spent
While vision staggered through a veiled instant
Of disbelief.
Soulshaken I shivered: in shadow they’d gone;
My own scornful shade, surreptitious, slid on
Insidiously.

Half-blind I resigned to the dark of the hill
Allcompassing me in green-gathering chill
Persuasively.
But the finger of noon forced a way through the leaves,
My shadow surrendered and the butterflies sneezed
This close to me.

Tia Azulay 22Oct91-14Feb07
Copyright © 1991, 2007 Tia Azulay

{Tue 13 February 2007} Psalm 42 Revisited

Psalm 42 Revisited

“As the deer pants for streams of water,
so my soul pants for you, O God.”

My soul writhes
over dust-dry land,
sucking promises
from air long dead;
desert-crazed,
visionary,
dazed
with longing,
longing.

My thirst bursts
through aching earth,
batters
desperate
banks.

Desolation wilts
as desire swirls
into nostrils
and ears,
sweeps me aside
into eddies of abandon,
plucks me back
into the choking
swim.

Dormant soil burns
my groping skin,
flows
through claws that gasp
for your eluding
jugular.

I am drowning
in the lack of you.
Your great
otherwhereness
engulfs me,
twists my grasping tongue
till blood flows;
I swallow
my own life-stream
which mirages yours,
O image-maker of whom no image can satisfy.

Tia Azulay Jan89-01Feb08
Copyright © 1989, 2008 Tia Azulay

The above poem responds to: Psalm 42

{Sun 11 February 2007} whirlwind visit

whirlwind visit

pattering, spattering rain races mission-bent to earth,
alert, seeking, challenging for territory,
it sprays grass and laps up dry land
as poppies pound and skip incorrigibly
to tease its watery muzzle.

today, our trees seem not so much
at mercy of the cavorting current
as at play with it;
dancing, dodging, mocking
leaves laugh out loud
at its tail-chasing;

the old bluegum,
bowing gently to humour
the bristling threat,
lets it sniff around awhile,
then shoos it out

and, with a tailwisp wag, it
whisks over the hedge:
we are unscathed,
but thrilled,
alive.

Tia Azulay 10Oct88-11Feb07
Copyright © 1988, 2007 Tia Azulay

{Thu 8 February 2007} Eye Storm

Eye Storm

Autumn thickens till the hanging days
Are changing past my window like a scream.
This winter thought too early paralyzes.
My aching eye gazes green — gold — gone.
The glazed day whips into strangeness
And lunar laughter rises, suddenly strong
As tears of light fade behind this skyline,
Mocking the blush on another hemisphere.

At last, rain churns across the glowing rim,
Tripping and falling on silver rooves,
Dappling darkness; moon glooms under cloud.

Under cover of cloud, night writhes,
Pierced by a star, and dies, weeping,
Into grass new-strewn with beauty quivering.

{Thu 8 February 2007} virgin confidence

virgin confidence

ah
friend
it must be like this
to make love
feeling the sharp compulsive angle
of my suffering
received, absorbed, into the tender cushion
of your acceptance
feeling your smile’s fertile caress
diffusing pain
delivering me
into
yes

{Wed 7 February 2007} OntheDeathof Saddam Hussein

On the Death of Saddam Hussein
– A Response to “Damn-Sad” by Ian Reed

When musing on the myriad ways to die
We often fail to challenge our own lie
That others’ deaths are distant from our own
And we’ll be graced with mercy we’ve not shown.

His death becomes not him, nor one of us.
It rather bursts the boil of poisoned pus
That festers in our mind beneath the sham
Of righteousness we keep up in our scam.

Pretending love and truth are ours to know
And teach and judge and finally bestow,
We claim a seat on heaven’s judgment bench
While seraphs recoil at our ghastly stench.

“Who sheds the blood of man,” the prophet said,
“By man his blood is always to be shed.”
But can you see an end of peace in this?
The prophet saw the worst of our abyss,

But did his words prescribe, or only show
The depths we’d sink to, blow for vengeful blow,
If pain and loss and fear remained our measure
Instead of hope in god-shaped humans’ treasure?

What purpose holds the prophet’s role or mine
If we can only speak, observe, enshrine
The status quo? This must not be our goal!
Transcend what was and is with “Will be whole!”

{Mon 5 February 2007} Coming to terms

Coming to terms

I miss him.
His otherwhereness is solid about me.

No longer raw,
I seem whole beyond tearing now, for him,
As I tore then.

But some days, musical days,
A sadness beyond tears hangs in, makes its own void in,
My breast:

I had dangerously given my heart as well,
When I thought I only loved him.

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