- Last seen on Jul 4 10:24 AM. Member since July 6, 2007.
- I have 14 comments, 2 poems
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on In Just – Spring by e e cummings, on July 4The spacing on this poem is way off. It is not supposed to be aligned with the left side of the screen. The way it is typed here greatly detracts from the appeal of the poem.
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on Tonight I Can Write The Saddest Lines by Pablo Neruda, on June 10This is definitely not one of Neruda's better poems, but it does have some nuggets in it worth reading. And it's a sweet poem on the loss of love, one I wish I couldn't relate to, but unfortunately can.
The translation does seem a little off in places, or perhaps a little stilted, but translation is a tough thing to do. To stay true to the feeling of the poem or to the literal word choice? Each translator does his or her best, but it's often only an approximation of the original.
I read this version in the Neruda book that I own, and the translation of this poem there is by a different translator, so many of the lines are slightly different, sometimes for the better and sometimes for the worse.
The line that I most liked in my translation is different in this one, though. It is the fifth line from the end. In the translation by W.S. Merwin, the lines reads like this:
"Love is so short, forgetting is so long."
It's those last four words that I remembered, even months after I read the poem.
Forgetting really is so long...
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on The Man-moth by Elizabeth Bishop, on April 15I really love this poem. It was this poem along with one other that drew me to her writing. I look forward to reading more of it.
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on The Banyan Tree by Rabindranath Tagore, on July 6, 2007I don't know what a Banyan tree looks like, but this poem reminds me of an old man, a Rastafarian or a griot with shaggy locks and bent limbs, a man who attracts children because he can let them be. He does not expect them to change for him. He accepts them as they are. So, they come to him. They surround him, and they dream.
