Franz Kafka

Thursday, May 23, 2013

The Poems of Trieste and Five Poems for the Game of Soccer by Umberto Saba (eBook) - A selection of some of the best poetry by Italian Master Umberto Saba, translated in English


Book cover, Copyright © 2013 Alessandro Baruffi ISBN: 978-1-304-03092-4

                                 
Today, Umberto Saba (pseudonym of Umberto Poli, 1883–1957) is widely recognized as one of the most prominent European poets of the 20th century. Born in the cosmopolitan port town of Trieste, under the Austro-Hungarian rule, in his youth, Saba struggled with hardship and poverty. After quitting his commercial studies, he joined the mercantile marine, and later the army, enlisting in the infantry regiment. While Saba successfully published his work for over three decades enjoying very favorable reception by critics, he remained an outsider to the Italian literary establishment. Following anti-Semitic laws and persecution, he migrated to Paris, returning to Italy only in 1943, where he remained under cover until the end of World War II. His verses, tinged with melancholy and filled with compassion for the world's misery, are expressed in a language characterized by a sophisticated simplicity: light and rich of everyday words, yet musical and profound in poetic effect.
Available as e-book on Amazon KindleiPhone, iPad, or iPod touch, NOOK Book  , Kobo and on Lulu. 

Saturday, May 11, 2013

Minha Mãe (A Poem, Portuguese)



   Arrangement in Grey and Black No.1, Whistler's Mother, 1871,
James McNeill Whistler, Musée d'Orsay, Paris.

Minha Mãe


Ela està  assim, o olhar
direito para minha infelicidade:

tão triste, calado, meu eterno lar.

E eu assim, olhando para ela
de olhos baixos, pedindo desculpas
pela minha tristeza e a dela.

Minha mãe, indo me olhando a cada dia
de minha vida, tentando vasculhar
o fundo porão de minha alma sombria.

Me olhando sem falar, sem pedir 

nem nada querer, com os seus olhos
cheios de perdão, as ternas mãos fracas, 
e as minhas, que tenho medo de estender.     

Copyright © 2013 LiteraryJoint

Thursday, May 9, 2013

The Ancient Lament, by Giosue Carducci, English Translation (Pianto Antico, Rime Nuove)


"Rime Nuove", by G. Carducci, cover 1887
www.casacarducci.it - copyright © 2005

The Ancient Lament, by Giosue Carducci, from New Rhymes, 1887

 

The tree you used to reach
your infant's hand out to,
the verdant pomegranate
with pretty vermilion flowers,
in the mute solitary orchard
has now just turned green
for June is restoring it
with light and warmth.
You, blossom of my own
shaken and parched tree,
you, of my vain life
ultimate and only flower,
lay in the chilly ground,
lay in the black ground;
neither can the sun gladden you
nor love awaken you again.

Translated by LiteraryJoint

Original version in Italian:

Saturday, May 4, 2013

Amongst all Things I Cherish You Most, a Poem



Edvard Munch, Separation, 1900, Edvard Munch Gallery

Amongst all things I cherish you most:
silent, deserted tracks,
paths winding steeply up
to the hazy tops, murmurs of footsteps
muffled by silent slopes,
ascensions to sylvan hermitages.

When the first snow
shuts all man within their weary
dwellings, then even the timid fox
sticks its head out of the woods,
sniffing with its pointed nose the air
in the scant November dusk.   

Similarly a vagrant finds some peace
and no longer despairs in his wandering,
when the blackening earth closes the corolla
of the horizon, and like ancient weeping,
the oblivious, sooty sky
is a mute blanket, unutterable.       

Copyright © 2013 LiteraryJoint
Go to the Author's Bookstore.