#bilingual poetry

ecc-poetry:

orácules / joss whedon

-elisa chavez

No me sorprende.
No es jumpscare.
Cuando tenía 18 años,
famélica-flaca
con la mente hirviendo,

me coqueteaste.

En mi cosplay de Inara,
fui una muñeca de muñeca.
Todo el mundo es tu casa

de muñecas.
Tu fábrica de violación.
Manipulas los miembros,
haciendo y deshaciéndo;
grabas tus historias en carne.
Cuando la luna crecía,
tú la torturabas por brillar.

La cortaste en cuatro y tiraste.
Hablaste por su boca
y tragaste el crédito.

Of course, I’m a feminist.
I have piles of affidavits.
Have you seen how she slays?
Have you seen her be the moon,
waxing and wild?

The dolls in a house don’t control
how they move. Have you seen
my alleyful of oracles?

Since antiquity,
we’ve picked the right man
to interpret flailing limbs.
To frame breasts
and madnesses,
cleanse foreign rages
into something palette-able.

The oracles say they’re happy.
They told me to tell you
how happy they are.

Reader translations:

@thehappymediumsteapot(here)

@cinqueform(here)

saltbright:

ecc-poetry:

misteerie:

ecc-poetry:

la verdad / the storybook

Tengo miedo a decirte
de mi madre, porque
ella tiene sangre en vez de miel.
Cuando yo era desierto,
su amor no podía arreglarme.
Trató chistes, vergüenza,
panóptica. Nada.

Temo decirte de María
(aunque su nombre no es María)
porque ha hecho llorar a su hija.

María vigila a cuatro niñes,
hijes y sobrines, y ella sabe que
si aparta la mirada,
esta américa les dispensa
como cenizas. ICE ha detenido
a su esposo. Pero no es
suficiente. También debe
llenar al dolor sin fondo
de su hija, y sonreírse
como primavera,
y dejarte pesar su corazón
como fruta pulposa.

Tu madre no es muñeca de perla.
¿Por qué debe ser la mía?

I was afraid to tell this story
of a mother, and so
I made her better than a mother.
She crosses the desert
on feet of dainty marvel,
each christening tear
a pure crystal.

This woman, Maria
(we may as well call her Maria)
has cried rios grandes,

her life a pastel tragedy
so huge and blunt you can’t help
but accept it.
Her mind is a breast
plumped with milk:
she thinks only of feeding.
She telegraphs gestures
like windmills
to tolerant living rooms.
Stainless, how she gleams!
No mildew, no algae,
no rust.

A mother just empty enough
to glove your white hand.

-elisa chavez

For more information on the Miss Translated series, it’s on Goodreads???? Whoa! I didn’t put it there.

I am afraid to tell you

of my mother, because

she has blood instead of honey.

When I was desert,

Her love couldn’t fix me.

She tired jokes, shame,

Panóptica*. Nothing.

I’m afraid to tell you about María

(although her name is not María)

because she has made her daughter cry.

María watches over four children,

daughters and nephews, and she knows that if you look away,

this America dispenses them

like ashes. ICE has arrested

Her husband. But it isn’t

Enough. You should

Fill the endless pain

Your daughter has, and smile

Like spring,

And allow yourself to feel her heart

Like pulpy fruit.*

Your mother is not a doll of pearl.

Why should mine be?

im not fluent in spanish nor am i a translator! corrections/additions are 100% welcomed

Panóptica, im not sure what this means, i looked around and found a mexican band that does electronic music, and also a drug company.

I wasnt sure of how to translate this sentence sp if anyone has any more insights pls lmk

Blessed by another reader translation! I love these so much.

Fun fact: This poem is based on the divide between the Latine immigrant experiences represented in “American Dirt” by Jeanine Cummins and my own experiences as a Chicana whose family works on immigrant rights. 

[I’m learning Spanish and still FAR from fluent, so please forgive my errors! There were a few parts I read a little differently than @misteerie did in their reader translation, so I thought I’d try translating it, too. Most of this is the same as theirs, but I put the differences in orange in case anyone else likes comparing translations lol.]

the truth

I’m scared to tell you
about my mother, because
she has blood in place of honey.
When I was adesert,*
her love couldn’t fix me.
She tried jokes, shame,
surveillance.* Nothing.

I’m afraid to tell you about María
(even though her name isn’t María)
because she’s made her daughter cry.

María watches over four kids,
her own and her siblings’,* and she knows that
if she looks away,
this America will scatterthem
like ashes. ICE has already taken
her husband. But it’s not
enough.She* must also fill her daughter’s
bottomless grief, and smile
likespringtime,
and leave you to weigh her heart
likefleshy fruit.

Your mother is not a pearl doll.
Why should mine be?

–

[*cuando era desierto: I was really indecisive over whether to translate “desierto” to a more definite emotional state, like “depressed” or “desolate,” but (and I might be totally off here, both in interpreting the language and the poetry) I interpreted the original line as a metaphor, so translating it literally to “desert” seemed truer to that.

*panóptica: this word choice really interested me and is what made me want to try actually translating this poem instead of just doing it in my head. I’m not sure, but I think it’s a loanword coming from “panopticon,” so “surveillance” seemed to fit.

*cuatro niñes, / hijes y sobrines: I wanted to preserve the gender neutral language, but I think my way just ended up kinda clunky. :/

*También debe llenar…: I went back and forth between interpreting these lines as “It (ICE) must…” or “She (María) must…”. I didn’t give a lot of consideration to “You should…” because we already have the informal “dejarte”, so I didn’t think a shift into usted was likely.]

misteerie:

ecc-poetry:

la verdad / the storybook

Tengo miedo a decirte
de mi madre, porque
ella tiene sangre en vez de miel.
Cuando yo era desierto,
su amor no podía arreglarme.
Trató chistes, vergüenza,
panóptica. Nada.

Temo decirte de María
(aunque su nombre no es María)
porque ha hecho llorar a su hija.

María vigila a cuatro niñes,
hijes y sobrines, y ella sabe que
si aparta la mirada,
esta américa les dispensa
como cenizas. ICE ha detenido
a su esposo. Pero no es
suficiente. También debe
llenar al dolor sin fondo
de su hija, y sonreírse
como primavera,
y dejarte pesar su corazón
como fruta pulposa.

Tu madre no es muñeca de perla.
¿Por qué debe ser la mía?

I was afraid to tell this story
of a mother, and so
I made her better than a mother.
She crosses the desert
on feet of dainty marvel,
each christening tear
a pure crystal.

This woman, Maria
(we may as well call her Maria)
has cried rios grandes,

her life a pastel tragedy
so huge and blunt you can’t help
but accept it.
Her mind is a breast
plumped with milk:
she thinks only of feeding.
She telegraphs gestures
like windmills
to tolerant living rooms.
Stainless, how she gleams!
No mildew, no algae,
no rust.

A mother just empty enough
to glove your white hand.

-elisa chavez

For more information on the Miss Translated series, it’s on Goodreads???? Whoa! I didn’t put it there.

I am afraid to tell you

of my mother, because

she has blood instead of honey.

When I was desert,

Her love couldn’t fix me.

She tired jokes, shame,

Panóptica*. Nothing.

I’m afraid to tell you about María

(although her name is not María)

because she has made her daughter cry.

María watches over four children,

daughters and nephews, and she knows that if you look away,

this America dispenses them

like ashes. ICE has arrested

Her husband. But it isn’t

Enough. You should

Fill the endless pain

Your daughter has, and smile

Like spring,

And allow yourself to feel her heart

Like pulpy fruit.*

Your mother is not a doll of pearl.

Why should mine be?

im not fluent in spanish nor am i a translator! corrections/additions are 100% welcomed

Panóptica, im not sure what this means, i looked around and found a mexican band that does electronic music, and also a drug company.

I wasnt sure of how to translate this sentence sp if anyone has any more insights pls lmk

Blessed by another reader translation! I love these so much.

Fun fact: This poem is based on the divide between the Latine immigrant experiences represented in “American Dirt” by Jeanine Cummins and my own experiences as a Chicana whose family works on immigrant rights. 

coreanas / the shooting

elisa chavez

Díme coreanas
y da el dolor
su apellido.

Díme coreanas
como fotos que
la recuerdan de su mamá.

Dices coreana
y significa excepción,
tumba de chinas rotas,
fantasma morena,
plano como ukiyo-e.
Cuando tus vecines
te necesitan, queride,
no quieren la teoría.
Necesita tu voz,
sin excusas.

Tengo una hanbok
sobre mi armario,
rosa y floja
como pulmón.
Lloramos juntas,
invisibles,
en silencio.

Say coriander
fresh from the branch,
parse it.

Say Koran,
five prayers.
The memory of mothers.

Say core of the issue:
Sexism. Class.
Say the worms
and the women they gnaw.

What else
is there
to say?

It’s another rough week in America. I wrote this piece for my friend today, inspired by listening to her experiences over the past few days. She has graciously given me her permission to do so. Be good to yourselves and each other. Listen to your AAPI neighbors and support them in the ways they ask for. Love to you all. 

ecc-poetry:

orácules / joss whedon

-elisa chavez

No me sorprende.
No es jumpscare.
Cuando tenía 18 años,
famélica-flaca
con la mente hirviendo,

me coqueteaste.

En mi cosplay de Inara,
fui una muñeca de muñeca.
Todo el mundo es tu casa

de muñecas.
Tu fábrica de violación.
Manipulas los miembros,
haciendo y deshaciéndo;
grabas tus historias en carne.
Cuando la luna crecía,
tú la torturabas por brillar.

La cortaste en cuatro y tiraste.
Hablaste por su boca
y tragaste el crédito.

Of course, I’m a feminist.
I have piles of affidavits.
Have you seen how she slays?
Have you seen her be the moon,
waxing and wild?

The dolls in a house don’t control
how they move. Have you seen
my alleyful of oracles?

Since antiquity,
we’ve picked the right man
to interpret flailing limbs.
To frame breasts
and madnesses,
cleanse foreign rages
into something palette-able.

The oracles say they’re happy.
They told me to tell you
how happy they are.

Reader translations:

@thehappymediumsteapot(here)

@cinqueform(here)

cinqueform:

ecc-poetry:

orácules / joss whedon

-elisa chavez

No me sorprende.
No es jumpscare.
Cuando tenía 18 años,
famélica-flaca
con la mente hirviendo,

me coqueteaste.

En mi cosplay de Inara,
fui una muñeca de muñeca.
Todo el mundo es tu casa

de muñecas.
Tu fábrica de violación.
Manipulas los miembros,
haciendo y deshaciéndo;
grabas tus historias en carne.
Cuando la luna crecía,
tú la torturabas para brillar.

La cortaste en cuatro y tiraste.
Hablaste por su boca
y tragaste el crédito.

Of course, I’m a feminist.
I have piles of affidavits.
Have you seen how she slays?
Have you seen her be the moon,
waxing and wild?

The dolls in a house don’t control
how they move. Have you seen
my alleyful of oracles?

Since antiquity,
we’ve picked the right man
to interpret flailing limbs.
To frame breasts
and madnesses,
cleanse foreign rages
into something palette-able.

The oracles say they’re happy.
They told me to tell you
how happy they are.

My attempt at a translation, and with respect:

I am not surprised.

This is not a jumpscare.

When I was eighteen,

Skinny like I was starving,

With a mind on fire,

You flirted with me.

In my Inara cosplay,

I was a doll of a doll.

The whole world is

Your dollhouse.

Your rape factory.

You manipulate the limbs,

Doing and undoing;

You record your stories in flesh.

When the moon waxed,

You tortured her for shining.

You quartered her and threw her away.

You spoke through her mouth

And swallowed the credit.

thehappymediumsteapot:

ecc-poetry:

orácules / joss whedon

-elisa chavez

No me sorprende.
No es jumpscare.
Cuando tenía 18 años,
famélica-flaca
con la mente hirviendo,

me coqueteaste.

En mi cosplay de Inara,
fui una muñeca de muñeca.
Todo el mundo es tu casa

de muñecas.
Tu fábrica de violación.
Manipulas los miembros,
haciendo y deshaciéndo;
grabas tus historias en carne.
Cuando la luna crecía,
tú la torturabas para brillar.

La cortaste en cuatro y tiraste.
Hablaste por su boca
y tragaste el crédito.

Of course, I’m a feminist.
I have piles of affidavits.
Have you seen how she slays?
Have you seen her be the moon,
waxing and wild?

The dolls in a house don’t control
how they move. Have you seen
my alleyful of oracles?

Since antiquity,
we’ve picked the right man
to interpret flailing limbs.
To frame breasts
and madnesses,
cleanse foreign rages
into something palette-able.

The oracles say they’re happy.
They told me to tell you
how happy they are.

For those who don’t know enough Spanish to appreciate half of this (or maybe even to catch that the right side is not a translation, and therefore get the whole point of the poem) here you go. Apologies, as my Spanish is quite scanty so I mostly relied on Google.

I’m not surprised.

It’s not a jump scare.

When I was 18,

famished-skinny

with my mind boiling,

you flirted with me. *

In my Inara cosplay,

I was a doll of a doll.

The whole world is your house

of dolls.

Your rape factory.

You manipulate the limbs,

doing and undoing;

you record your stories in the flesh.

When the moon grew

you tortured her to shine.

You cut it in four and threw it away.

You spoke through her mouth

And you swallowed the credit.

*I can’t be certain, but I think Google is being a bit prudish here. I’d appreciate it if someone who speaks Spanish better than me can confirm whether “me coqueteaste” means something more sinister than “flirted with me.”

Reader translationnnnnn!!!!

So, as those of you who follow me may know, I’m a Chicana and not natively bilingual. Sometimes I choose the wrong words or make grammar mistakes. On the one hand: embarrassing. On the other: heckin’ authentic to my experience as someone whose family underwent assimilation and language deprivation over several generations.

I try to let my mistakes just be a part of the imperfect translations in some cases, but not when I feel it impedes understanding or messes with the mood. So!

• For “fábrica de violación,” I intended something closer to “factory of violation”
• In the penultimate stanza, I see I made a classic por/para mistake, and will update that later this morning!

As ever, thank you all for reading, for engaging, and for puzzling.

tejanos /why did so many hispanics vote for trump?

elisa chavez

Tío, su casa tiene
escalones faltantes.
Pero en vez de cambiarlos,
ha cambiado si mismo.
Toma pasos largos,
forma músculo, sabe bootstrapear.
Forja carácter ¿y por qué?
¿Para sobrevivir?
¿Porque la vida sin amor
no es la vida?

No soy su enemigo.
Vengo con mis
martillos y medidas,
y debe pensar que condeno
todo lo suyo–
pero no.

Simplemente le quiero.
Simplemente pienso
en la noche. Pienso en usted,
dando un paso en la noche,
en la oscuridad.
El momento en que espera
algo sólido,
pero recibe
el vapor.

When people say
they don’t like Mexicans,
they don’t mean me.
Immigrants have changed
since I came here; now
they’re illegal. Handout hagglers.
Now they have no desire
to better themselves–
that’s what people mean.
Not me.

You kids are skinned so thin
these days–
martyrs and measurers,
bellyaching battle-drums
with all your words
for spelling anger.

I simply look at what’s there:
Jobs or no jobs.
Neighbors at church.
The rig bones
of a home built solid.
The ladder of opportunity
rising to heaven
rung
by rung.

Further reading:

• TheMiss Translated poems
• Politico:Trump Didn’t Win the Latino Vote in Texas. He Won the Tejano Vote.
• Miss Translated: the immigrant rights benefit e-chapbook!
• Support the author on PatreonorKo-Fi

ecc-poetry:

la bandera / américa
elisa chavez

¿Sabes qué?

En Barcelona,
hay catedral inconclusa.
Hace más que un siglo,
pálidos cuerpos de santos
y agujas sin resolución
se han formado como coral.

¿Cuántos manos la tocaron?
¿Cuánto tenemos que esperar
para el coronamiento?
Perdemos la paciencia.
Muchas personas
nos han hecho promesas
y cada incompleta nos merma.

Sin embargo,
todo el mundo la visita.
Quizás la gente cree en
la promesa de su mármol.
Quizás mitad-maravilla
es mejor que nada.
Cuando te vengo, sagrada,
traigo ladrillo.

Don’t you know?

This country
is like returning to my childhood
home and finding
bodies in the drywall.
Like learning I’ve been bred
on bone-dust

and martyr marrow.
Not my parents’ strong hands.
Not my spine.
This country’s concrete lullaby
makes my mind a petri dish:
replicate and replicate.
It makes a coroner of me.

The sins I’ve eaten
embarrass me,
this genteel cannibal feast.
How could I not know
whose marbled meat?
America, you cauldron.
You sacred vein.
You tourniquet.

Miss Translated is an exploration of identity, language, family history, and the things that get lost in translation. If you like this work, consider buying the Miss Translated chapbook. Proceeds benefit the New Sanctuary Coalition, an immigrant rights group based in NYC. You can also support the author on Patreon.

La llorona / campo de concentración

Elisa Chavez

Nacida María, 
se llaman “La Llorona" 
porque sus gritos 
hacen sangrar las orejas 
de poderosos hombres. 
Cortan el aire, 
llamando la ruina 
como tormenta.

Se niegan a decirle 
dónde están sus hijes. 
Su único crimen es cruzar. 
Ella llora porque 
sus hijes están en jaulas. 
Están cubiertes de heces, moco, 
leche materna. Los carceleros 
no les dejan dormir, 
y sin dormir no pueden soñar.

La llorona ronda 
la orilla del río, 
rasgando el vestido blanco.
Los carceleros se molestan 
por su falta de civismo: 
están ahogando a niñes 
y preferían hacerlo en paz.
El alarido de la llorona 
clama justicia:
"¿Dónde están mis hijes?”

La Llorona 
was a selfish woman.
Beautiful but shallow. 
(Aren’t they all?)
Her children interfered 
with her ambition, 
so she dragged them 
to the riverbed.

When the monster mama 
crossed into heaven, 
she concealed her crimes, 
and would not tell the angels
where her children were. 
They said to her, “You cannot enter 
unless you do it the right way," 
and turned her 
from heaven’s border.

Don’t let La Llorona catch you 
by the river, 
where she still searches 
for the anchor of her babies. 
She haunts the banks
in her bone-white dress 
and bloody reaching nails, 
howling down the sun 
with her cries:
"WHERE ARE MY CHILDREN?”

Good morning everybody! This is an old-new poem, first published last year in Miss Translated: A Benefit for the New Sanctuary Coalition. Today I present it to you featuring hopefully-more-legible-typeface! colors??? and, as ever, a grammar mistake I noticed at the very last minute. Don’t forget to abolish ICE! Besos a todes.