Photo by Pink Sherbet Photography All my being is a dark verse that repeats you to the dawn of unfading flowering and growth. I conjured you in my poem with a sigh and grafted you to water, fire,…
Poetry
Photo by ~dgies/FlickrBilingual recordings by the author and Lyn Coffin9Death is when the heart does not beat and the clock beats. Love is when the heart beats and the clock…- [Click here to read the lyrics in Farsi.] The whole of my being is a dark verse of Scripture which in its repeated recitations will take you away to the dawn of eternal buddings and bloomings.I…
Misrak Terefe (far right) with fellow Ethiopian performance poets.This says the meaning of country is sitting in the balance.In order to say, to be able to see,the balance, the lead…
For a group of art performances in July 2013 called Wax and Gold organized by the Netsa Art Village, visual artist Mulugeta Gebrekidan presented “Invading Samsung Square” to protest the corpo…
for Mia CoutoDream, Dream, …
Photo by Brent Pearson/FlickrNegative SpaceII was born on a Tuesday in April.I didn’t cry. Not because I was stunned. I wasn’t even mad.I was the lucky egg, trained for gratitudeinside the belly for n…
Photo: Kristina Sheppard/FlickrA Young Horse I’ve never figured out what world I live in.I rode on a horse as young and as happy as I.When he galloped I could feel his heartbeatAgainst my thighsA…
Photo by Alberto VarelaBio How unlike a dead fish a live fish is – Maxine Hong KingstonKiedy byłam rybąKosmos jak zawsz…
Todd Stewart, “Fence Line, Tule Lake Relocation Center, 2001,” from Placing Memory: A Photographic Exploration of Japanese American Internment (University of Oklahoma Press, 2008).Eating Nood…
The author reading at the Gogol House Museum in Moscow, February 2014. Photo © Anna Dikareva.Listen to videotaped recordings of both Russian originals in the following clip (4:00-10:05).…
Swallows. Photo by Kenneth Cole Schneider/FlickrThe SwallowsG. Mend-Ooyo Returning from afar, swallows in flocksEmbrace the tales of the gentle, tranquil steppe.The waters of ete…
Photo by Katerina Cheiladaki Translator’s note: Arvanitika, or Arberishte as it is called in the Corinthian mountain villages, is one of the many languages in the world facin…
Photo by Marjan Lazarevski Jesucristo’is Ja’ Ñäjktyäj’ya Äj’ Tzumama’is Kyionuksku’yÄj’ tzumama’is ja’ myuspäkä’ kastiya’orenatzu’ jyambä’ä ngyomis’kyionukskutyamnatzu’ xaä’ tumä nabdzu’jya…
The Gardener I learned to plant trees with my grandfather.“The willows need more water than you, Andrés,and their rootsin the beginning aren’tvery deep.Sometimes they grow so fastand sometim…
Author note: These flash semi-témoignages or reportages are inspired by stories people told me It began as…
How tenderly the stream flowsamong the numberless blossomswhose heads dip and weavein the tepid east wind, how warmthe insect tune, and multitudethe ripe green grasses, rank on rankthrough which…- WishesWish I could still laugh with the lotusOn the bank of the Nile Take off my clothes And dive into the Zambezi Join spirit dancersIn the middle of the GangesRomp with…
Photo by GwagaLittle Men Animals no longer speakDrums refuse to beatTanganyika slowly retreats From her shoresBloodied by the nightmare of menWhose pettiness piercesThe deep slumber of the a…
Photo by Pieter Stockmans“Syrian refugees go about their business in a refugee camp in Mafraq, Jordan . . .” Ropes on poles, jeans & shirt…
Translators’ NoteJuan Hernández Ramírez describes both Nahuatl and Spanish as mirrors for his writing: “sirven de espejo, kewak se teskatl.” He does not write solely in one l…
Photo by Kables/FlickrTheir language rolls out, soft carpet in front of them.Strolling slowly beneath trees, men in white shirts, belts, baggy trousers,women in scarves,glinting cigaret…- Clay Tablet Bearing the World’s First AlphabetThat had comemuch later –After everythingalready had happened –Without witnessthe first stammeredwordthis atomic flashforevercontaminatingthe oblivious cr…
- The first time I saw your father,I stared back into the pool at your reflectionwhile he waded through,the water moving in gentle circles away from us.The first time, I thought it was the Nilewe’d dipp…
- IBefore what happened happened,I mean, before the towers became a stairway to the dayof reckoning, and the world split into twocamps, water and sand,I used to wish that I’d be among the poetswho would…
