The following is a translation of the Rose Auslander poem by Mike Rose. 

Into Life

 

Only in the motherhood of grief

Does the fullness of experience stream into me.

She feeds me for a long, bleary time

With black milk and heavy wormwood wine.

 

Within her body I grow like a child

Shrouded in night-song and shadow spaces

Until my woes are ripe and sighted

And the womb expels me from the dream.

 

 

And all the paths plunge towards me

each takes me into its otherness

And evenings attend, great with golden stillness

As angels about my transfigured pain.

This is an informal translation and Mike makes the following comment:

I've been fairly direct rather than poetic in the translation, and two lines still bother me. 'Mutterinnigkeit' (l.1) is one of those German words that means 20 different things - could be translated as motherly intimacy, being-within-motherness, motherhood or something else...    'Sehend' in l.7 could be 'seeing' but I think there's also the implication of 'visible', so I went for 'sighted' to try to catch both.

Jaime

On Feb 14, 2018, at 2:20 PM, Luke <[log in to unmask]> wrote:

That would be great!

Cheers,

Luke

On 14 February 2018 at 17:05, Jaime Robles <[log in to unmask]> wrote:

Continuing the below: By that I meant an unpublished translation … one done for the moment for the purposes of understanding. 

jaimerobles.com

______________________________

QS: Let’s return to poetics.

JR: When did we leave?

—From the conversation between Quinta Slef and Joan Retallack, The Poethical Wager

On Feb 14, 2018, at 8:58 AM, Jaime Robles <[log in to unmask]> wrote:

Luke, When you first wrote about this I thought you were looking for a translation, so I asked a friend to do one. He has gotten back to me with a translation and a caveat about a few of the words. Did you want a translation? Or were you looking for commentary only? Let me know….

jaimerobles.com

______________________________

QS: Let’s return to poetics.

JR: When did we leave?

—From the conversation between Quinta Slef and Joan Retallack, The Poethical Wager

On Feb 13, 2018, at 1:02 PM, Luke <[log in to unmask]> wrote:

who'd have thought!

best,

Luke

On 13 February 2018 at 20:55, GILES GOODLAND <[log in to unmask]> wrote:

Royal Festival Hall, South Bank

---

From: Luke <[log in to unmask]>
To: [log in to unmask]
Sent: Tuesday, 13 February 2018, 20:53
Subject: Re: 'Black milk of daybreak'

what is an 'rfh'

thanks,

Luke

On 13 February 2018 at 09:39, Patrick McManus <[log in to unmask]> wrote:

Hi Luke can poetry library help ? at rfh London

On 13/02/2018 00:15, Luke wrote:

Sorry that's obviously just the first stanza, I took this screengrab from Dichtung wider Dicthung, by Jean Bollack

<image.png>

On 13 February 2018 at 00:10, Luke <[log in to unmask]> wrote:

I was surprised that no-one seems to have translated this reference to black milk into English. I believe it's where Celan took it from Rose Ausländer .

I'm just going to run it through google translate then, if no-one wants to!

Cheers,

Luke

Ins Leben

Nur aus der Trauer Mutterinnigkeit
strömt mir das Vollmaß des Erlebens ein.
Sie spiest mich eine lange, trübe Zeit
mit schwarzer Milch und schwerem Wermutwein