After Victor Hugo and other poems
After Victor Hugo
Despite the violence we’ve committed
to each other, despite the lies
we’ve believed to get by,
despite the suffering
we’ve blinded ourselves to,
despite the forgotten things,
write,
with the hands
that have done many wrongs,
but still believe that things do change,
however small, however little, here on this page,
which means, here on this earth.
Alinsunod Kay Victor Hugo
Sa kabila ng karahasan nagawa natin
sa isa’t isa, sa kabila ng mga kasinungalingan
na pinaniwalaan upang makapahinga,
sa kabila ng mga pagdurusang
piniiling hindi makita,
sa kabila ng mga nilimot na,
magsulat ka,
gamit ang mga kamay
na marami na ring nagawang pagkakasala,
ngunit naniniwalang may magbabago pa,
kahit munti, kahit kaunti, dito sa pahina,
ibig sabihin, dito sa lupa.
A Message
Write on water,
so it goes,
what you want most
to forget.
If one should observe closely enough,
the narratives of erasure
are being ceaselessly inscribed
on the surface of the sea.
That which is writ is an erasure before it.
The old saying which
no one remembers
lies wrecked on the coast.
The shoreline
becomes a long invitation,
an unmappable distance.
The fine foam whispers
to the feet.
Each pebble stone, sea glass, shell, coral
implies a thought
until the pockets
are filled with presumptions.
To be the sea is to be devoid
of all possessions.
The sea is the sea because it cannot be anything else.
A poet once said, a poem
is a message in a bottle that hopes
to beach by the shore.
When I walked along the coast
after the storm, I thought of
how long the empty bottle
drifted before being found.
I stared at the sea
that healed each wound
as though I received a message.
With all my might, I threw it back.
Kalatas
Ilista sa tubig
ang mga bagay na nais mong
malimutan, sabi ng kasabihan.
Kung pagmamasdang mabuti,
walang humpay na itinatala
sa rabaw ng dagat
ang mga salaysay ng pagkabura.
ang bawat tala ay pagbubura sa nauna.
Sa pampang naiiwang nakauka
ang matandang salawikain
na walang nakatatanda.
Ang dalampasigan
ay mahabang paanyaya,
isang pagitan na hindi maimamapa.
May bulong ang mga pinong bulang
napipinaw sa paanan.
May pahiwatig ang bawat tipak
ng bato, bubog, kabibe, bahura
hanggang mapuno ang bulsa
ng mga akala.
Ang maging dagat ay paglagas
ng lahat ng pag-aari.
Kaya dagat ang dagat dahil hindi maaari.
Habilin ng isang makata, ang tula
ay mensahe sa bote na umaasang
maanod sa isang pampang.
Nang maglakad ako sa baybayin
pagkaraan ng bagyo, naisip ko
gaano katagal kayang nagpalutang-lutang
ang napulot na botelyang walang laman.
Tumitig ako sa dagat
ng pahilom ng bawat sugat
na tila may tinatanggap akong kalatas
buong lakas ko itong inihagi pabalik.
Autopsy
In the autopsy of my life
they will pry open my chest
and from there will surface
a fist
clenched tightly
and which they will need
to unravel each
finger from their hold
like the petals of a flower
only to behold at its heart its oblivion
Autopsiya
Sa autopsiya ng aking buhay
bubuksan nila ang aking dibdib
at iaahon mula roon
ang isang kamao
nakakuyom nang mahigpit
at kailangan nilang
tuklapin paisa-isa ang bawat
daliri sa pagkakapit
tulad ng mga talulot ng bulaklak
upang makita sa kaibuturan ang wala
Translator’s Statement
I remain hopeful in the act of translation—hoping not only that the power of the original text will remain unscathed but of translation’s transformative power. “However small, however little” the changes are, it is in these gaps between languages that the creativity of the translator sets in, where one sees the capability of the text to assume a different guise beyond its original linguistic limits. This is what I aspire to in my translation.
Allan Popa is the author of fifteen collections of poetry, including Narkotoko at Panganorin (Ateneo de Manila University Press, 2018), Damagan (UST Publishing House, 2018), and Autopsiya ng Aking Kamatayan (Tala Antala, 2019). He has received the Philippines Free Press Literary Award and the Manila Critics Circle National Book Award. He earned his MFA in Writing (Poetry) at Washington University in Saint Louis, where he won the Norma Lowry Prize and the Academy of American Poets Graduate Prize. He received his PhD in Literature from De La Salle University–Manila. He is the founding editor of Aklat Ulagad, a small press based in Catanduanes, Philippines.
Bernard Kean Capinpin is a poet, translator, and recipient of a PEN/Heim Translation Fund Grant.
