Highlights from the latest issue
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BEARING THE BURDEN OF SAMENESS: FOCUS ON CARE
MPT’s May issue ‘Bearing the Burden of Sameness’ spotlights the poetry of care. Featuring Rachel Rankin’s new translations of Brynjulf Jung Tjønn’s experiences of adoption in Norway, the myth of the Chinese river snail reborn in Tuoya Wulan’s version of Xinyang Wu, and Beth Hickling-Moore’s translation of Carla Nyman’s radically physical poetry of the body. Also: brand new translations of Palestinian poet Najwan Darwish by Kareem James Abu-Zeid, Olga Ulturgasheva on Siberian animist poetry, and Jenny He interviews Fiona Sze-Lorrain. All this and much more in the new issue of the groundbreaking magazine dedicated to poetry in translation: for a poetry magazine belonging to the world, read MPT.
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When Spring Comes
Najwan Darwish I told you I saw the land being led to the slaughter.
These are nightmares, you said,
they’ll end when spring comes
to the door of your home.
[...]
Translated by Kareem James Abu-Zeid
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Care Advice
Ester Naomi Perquin A girl is a peculiar kind of instrument: the harder
you hit, the softer her voice. Her body shrinks.
See the fine bones slip into their cells,
see the backbone wilt, the hesitancy
in those cutesy legs.
[...]Translated by David Colmer
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The Garden Must Tend Me
Abdullah O. Jimoh Last week, I did not attend jumu’ah
because overthinking numbed my strength.
Today, I flush tablets of hope down my throat
with water and attend jumu’ah. I must not allow
the chain of the past tether me like an anchor
clasping a ship. [...]Translated by the poet