Poem
James Fenton
HOW CAN THE HEART LIVE?
HOE KAN HET HART LEVEN?
Hoe kan het hart leven dat zo heeft liefgehad?Het lichaam dat van leugenloze liefde wist?
Want, herinner ik me, ik was niet gestoord
met mijn groot en smetteloos geluk,
de simpele vreugde om wat ik had.
En, herinner ik me, het klopte.
De tong liegt maar het lichaam niet.
En lang voordat de golven braken
Wist ik dat ik iets groots was kwijtgeraakt
En logica zegt me dat dat de liefde was.
Genegenheid met stroomstootjes van hoop
Dat is de liefde. Genegenheid stierf in de vlammen.
Geen verzekering: aardbeving, vuur en vloed,
Oorlog, hongersnood, pest – allemaal
Beproevingen van een blindverliefde God.
Op een verre Olympus van de ziel,
Achter de wolken-boomgrens van het brein,
Wordt er een oude wrokstrijd uitgevochten.
Met schijnbaar ons als gevolmachtigden
En er is geen genoegdoening en geen herstel.
Leef maar een tijdje zonder hoop, droef hart.
Droevige minnaar in deze verwoeste stad,
Leef met je verlies, die fraai verwoeste levens.
© Vertaling: 2008, Rob Schouten
HOW CAN THE HEART LIVE?
How can the heart live that loved once so well?The body that knew love without deceit?
For I remember now I was not mad
Loving my bright unblemished luck
And finding a simple joy in what I had.
And I remember now I was not deceived.
The tongue lies. Really, the body does not lie.
And long before the breaking of the wave
I knew there was some great good I had mislaid
And logic tells me what I lost was love.
Affection with an electric charge of hope
Is what love was. Affection died in the flames.
There’s no insurance: earthquake, fire and flood,
War, famine, pestilence – all such are deemed
The visitations of some love-crossed god.
On some remote Olympus of the soul,
Hidden beyond the brain’s cloud-forest line,
Some ancient grudge-match is being fought to the last.
It seems that we were proxies in the fight
And there’s no compensation, no redress.
Live without hope for a time, unlucky heart.
Unlucky lover in this ruined city,
Live with this loss, these lucky ruined lives.
© 2008, James Fenton
Publisher: First published on PIW,
‘How Can the Heart Live?’ is an extract from Tsunami, A Song Cycle.
Publisher: First published on PIW,
James Fenton
(United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, 1949)
James Fenton is a poet for whom ivory towers have long ceased to exist. His work is enacted in the midst of our world and is full of political and social charges. Already in his earliest poems, ‘Our Western Furniture’ for example, which is about the clash between American and Japanese culture, he displays his engagement. The Far East in particular, where he travelled a great deal as a journalis...
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HOW CAN THE HEART LIVE?
How can the heart live that loved once so well?The body that knew love without deceit?
For I remember now I was not mad
Loving my bright unblemished luck
And finding a simple joy in what I had.
And I remember now I was not deceived.
The tongue lies. Really, the body does not lie.
And long before the breaking of the wave
I knew there was some great good I had mislaid
And logic tells me what I lost was love.
Affection with an electric charge of hope
Is what love was. Affection died in the flames.
There’s no insurance: earthquake, fire and flood,
War, famine, pestilence – all such are deemed
The visitations of some love-crossed god.
On some remote Olympus of the soul,
Hidden beyond the brain’s cloud-forest line,
Some ancient grudge-match is being fought to the last.
It seems that we were proxies in the fight
And there’s no compensation, no redress.
Live without hope for a time, unlucky heart.
Unlucky lover in this ruined city,
Live with this loss, these lucky ruined lives.
HOW CAN THE HEART LIVE?
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