The 12th prompt is to “translate” a poem from another language, only on the basis of sound. I haven’t done much in the way of editing, except perhaps to remove the total disconnections of some lines, to rather make it seem like it flows, even if it doesn’t. Of course, as a first draft, I may severely alter it later on!

A second try at this. This time I chose a German poem. While I did study some German that was, oh, something like 45 years ago, so most of it is long gone. I tried to find a totally foreign language, but Arabic was beyond my abilities. Since I live in Canada where French is the other official language, I am reasonably familiar with the Latin based languages. And in fact I have studied those too, although many years ago as well. Wherever I encountered a word that I knew, I made an effort to go strictly by sound.

Upsetting

Found in a mine in stasis
answers in the slag locked leaves
answers clean green work
still hope springs and the young

thus we give answers
and yet strike without
these cursive stamps, strike
with clear outcomes

found in a mine over the wire
smuggled, fluted
it smacks us in the nose,
as we gaze, why bother them?

months and months
a fluid agent
a random mudhole
at random
this site

Carol A. Stephen
April 12, 2012