Monday 18 April 2016

The Smell of Snow

Pia Tafdrup's new collection Lugten af sne (The Smell of Snow) will be published by Gyldendal in May 2016.

One of the poems from the new book can be read in my translation here.

Sunday 17 April 2016

Caught in the Act

by Pia Tafdrup


The fish catches its food
and itself is caught, has its head
cut off with a cracking sound,
the smell of fish blood rises while
under the knife the fish still twitches.

The light bones and feathers
lie scattered among grass and stones,
where the bird circled in the air,
smelled its way to earthworms in the soil,
before the marten consumed its meal.

On the grassy plains a hungry wolf
goes after the sheep's bellies and guts,
on the carcasses the ribs
are gnawed away, flies and worms
take care of the last remnants.

In the dust among the rubble of war
the wounded lie,
I recognize the smell,
when an angel is grazed.

In the dust among the rubble of war
lie the dead,
victims of a bloody hour, who once
lay in wombs,
must now be placed in the grave
infinitely close to our hearts.

Breathing, collision,
the locations accumulate,
rocks and clods of earth,
the whole world is a crime scene.


translated from Danish by David McDuff


Essay Tour

I've translated a section from Gösta Ågren's latest collection, Dikter utan land (Schildts & Söderströms, 2015):

A tour through the essays of Ralph Waldo Emerson

The essays themselves are here.