Problems of Translation: Problems of Language

–June Jordan

1

I turn to my Rand McNally Atlas.

Europe appears right after the Map of the World.

All of Italy can be seen page 9.

Half of Chile page 29.

I take out my ruler.

In global perspective Italy

amounts to less than half an inch.

Chile measures more than an inch and a quarter

of an inch.

Approximately

Chile is as long as China

is wide:

Back to the Atlas:

Chunk of China page 17.

All of France page 5: As we say in New York:

Who do France and Italy know

at Rand McNally?

    2

I see the four mountains in Chile higher

than any mountain of North America.

I see Ojos del Salado the highest.

I see Chile unequivocal as crystal thread.

I see the Atacama Desert dry in Chile more than the rest

of the world is dry.

I see Chile dissolving into water.

I do not see what keeps the blue land of Chile

out of blue water.

I do not see the hand of Pablo Neruda on the blue land.

    3

As the plane flies flat to the trees

below Brazil

below Bolivia

below five thousand miles below

my Brooklyn windows

and beside the shifted Pacific waters

welled away from the Atlantic at Cape Horn

La Isla Negra that is not an island La

Isla Negra

that is not black

is stone and stone of Chile

feeding clouds to color

scale and undertake terrestrial forms

of everything unspeakable

    4

In your country

how do you say copper

for my country?

    5

Blood rising under the Andes and above

the Andes blood

spilling down the rock

corrupted by the amorality

of so much space

that leaves such little trace of blood

rising to the irritated skin the face

of the confession far

from home:

I confess I did not resist interrogation.

I confess that by the next day I was no longer sure

of my identity.

I confess I knew the hunger.

I confess I saw the guns.

I confess I was afraid.

I confess I did not die.

    6

What you Americans call a boycott

of the junta?

Who will that feed?

    7

Not just the message but the sound.

    8

Early morning now and I remember

corriendo a la madrugada from a different

English poem,

I remember from the difficulties of the talk

an argument

athwart the wine the dinner and the dancing

meant to welcome you

you did not understand the commonplace expression

of my heart:

the truth is in the life

la verdad de la vida

Early morning:

do you say la mañanita?

But then we lose

the idea of the sky uncurling to the light:

Early morning and I do not think we lose:

the rose we left behind

broken to a glass of water on the table

at the restaurant stands

even sweeter

por la mañanita