Thanks so much to Cara Holman for inviting me as Guest Poet at her blog, ‘Prose Posies’, for National Poetry Month on April 10, coincidentally the date when I first wrote this poem as a not-quite-sonnet, which I later worked on for submission to the Magnapoets Anthology. (Click on Prose Posies in my blogroll for Cara’s wonderful page of me and for the other daily guest poets).
To this We Wake
*
Scraps of purple on winter dawns
slung on arms of mornings
a sun awaiting for us
in between strutting seagulls
pigeons braiding shadows–
we snuggle.
*
We trace our days in dreams we
birth at dawn
when swatches of light
tickle us out to walk
on grounds of endearments our steps
have marked engraved by winds.
*
We step on
shredded blooms the seasons
gift us, stealing kisses, time on
halved imperfect whispers, wishes we rip
off the day, their ends we spangle on
skies, our secret into stars.
*
Yet we wake to another day–
what lies deeper than frost farther
than slumber, closer
to the core where
seasons sleep: to this, to this
we always wake.
*
Butterfly Away, Magnapoets Anthology Series 3, 2011
About Me from Cara’s questionnaire: (in parenthesis, what I wanted to add but changed my mind as my words started to tangle)
Alegria ‘Alee’ Imperial
Originally from Manila, Philippines now from Vancouver, Canada, (quite a simple deceiving shift of footstool in the globe)
I met you at NaHaiWriMo (where we daily shared a haiku for the same prompt for a year among many other poets. Touched by your spirit, I left parts of me in brief phrases on your space.)
Seriously into poetry in 2005, (shortly after workshop courses in fiction writing, years after writing nothing of me in media work and journalism, years of dreaming only in verse)
(I used to write more lyrical prose,) now mostly haiku, some tanka, and recently, haibun and also free verse when all three fail
April 16, 2012
Posted by alee9 |
lyric poetry, poetry | alegria imperial, Anthology Series 3, BC, Butterfly Away, Canada, Cara Hollman, haibun, haiku, journalism, Magnapoets, Manila, NaHaiWriMo, National Poetry Month, Philippines, Prose Posies, tnaka, Vancouver |
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unabashed–
a sparrow speaks in three tongues
twirling on willow twigs
It’s the subject of my post yesterday but I can’t seem to let it go! “My soul speaks in three languages” as in the three tanka I wrote from English, which I translated roughly into Spanish (and had it edited by Sr. Javier Galvan y Guijo, director of Instituto Cervantes in Oran, Algeria formerly of Manila where we met) and in Iluko, is an awarness that has been consuming me–this composing of words from three different dimensions that I believe are of my soul but not finding the right stage to unleash it, let it leap, dance, sing, sigh.
Finally, last month I dared to submit three tanka in three tongues to qarrtsiluni–an online literary journal where I’ve been reading awesome poetry–with an introductory essay I had posted here about the “willow” not having an equivalent in Iluko, the tongue I was born with. The editors accepted it, an honor I’m still riding on an upwind.
Unabashed, I would like to share here what Alex Cigale, translation theme editor, said as well as Jean who posted her comment on the qarrtsiluni site, and Patrick who sent it to my inbox. I hope you, dear readers, bear with me in this moment of exhilaration!
Alex Cigale (editor, translation issue, qarrtsiluni) January 12, 2011 at 4:35 pm | #1
What a treasure you sent our way, Alegria! So perfect for us, this window onto a language constructed according to logical grammatic structures that are yet so different from those we otherwise take for granted, qualities such as number, possession, direction, tense, intensity. And what a perfect illustration of the notion that there can be no words that do not represent real objects, so that such culturally-specific idioms are nearly ICONS, your example: “saning-i … portrays … usually a woman in a dark corner, splayed on the floor….” And the recording, the Iluko sounded last and thus echoing so musically, its music so liquid I am tempted to imagine that it was formed among the various sounds of water surrounding the islands. A big thank you!
Jean (tastingrhubarb)
January 13, 2011 at 6:47 am | #3
Oh, these are exquisite and exquisitely satisfying! Listening to the podcast is essential. This is a richness of experience of poetry and language and translation that no publication with only printed words could provide. So beautiful.
Patrick Gillespie (poemshape)
January 13, 2011, 7:14 PM
Finally, I get to hear your beautiful language. Such is the beauty of the language that I could fool myself into thinking that anyone who spoke it would write poetry such as yours. I have always loved the sound of the Mongolian Language, but I think Iluko is just as alluring and beautiful. I would love to speak it.
It’s also beautiful to see how you bring the sensibility of haiku into your longer poems. It’s something I’ve wondered about trying myself, but haven’t yet. Again, how wonderful to hear Iluko. There’s a Japanese expression which I can’t think of right now. It expresses the aesthetic of beautiful sorrow or beautiful sadness. Your poetry is so often imbued with it.
January 14, 2011
Posted by alee9 |
culturati news/views, haiku, language views, poetry, tanka | alegria imperial, Daily life, Daily wage, English, iluko, Instituto Cervantes, Javier Galvan y Guijo, jornales, Manila, Oran, Parick Gillespie, podcast, poemshape, poetry, qarrtsiluni, Spanish, tanka, tastingrhubarb, translation, willow |
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