• From Parallinear: 16 European Poets in Prose Translation (Symban Press 1977)

Jorisz Prokata, born Nembutå, Austro-Hungarian Empire, 1901; died Paris, 1943 […]

’Ndra ven ožedigō tranvu
Istahe zesfusna vo kōb
G’va: svas moe’, oxoaz, hežbu
Vem mižurt qocrsiūjy aplouxōb
Veń ġucij doīv.

L’gefq tsiži, xveby, qa indreza:
Kipidi, aūcu mdvo, lkåd’vud
Utcuzu, veń gomfōj’t vgeza
Vqežefq keflozu ven užud
Odzub’za lkåtū sxoīv.

It’s raining and I walk by the river
Watching gulls on the opposite bank.
Then: two ducks, mergansers, I think,
And I take off my glasses to wipe them
And take a closer look.

It’s now I see what the rain has done:
The small drops, pearl-patterns, constellating
The lenses, and so beautiful beneath the dull sky
That I cannot touch them and walk on
My panes full of stars.

Translator’s notes

[…] The paronomasia in the final line rests on the ambiguity of the contracted odzub’za, which could mean either odzubaza, “my pains, my sufferings” or odzupeza, “my lookers, my specs” (otsupa, “look, observe”), with sandhi of p to b before z.

Translation © Caroline Dawkins 1956