‘n Jong Hongaarse talent
Ágnes Lehóczky
Na my ietwat negatiewe Nuuswekker oor die Poolse digter Agnieska Mirahina gisteroggend, wil ek graag die volgende as korrektief plaas na aanleiding van die onderhoud op 3:AM Magazine wat met die jong Hongaarse digter Ágnes Lehóczky gevoer is; veral omrede sy na my mening ‘n veel beter digter is as eersgenoemde. By wyse van inleiding die volgende opmerking deur SJ Fowler, die onderhoudvoerder: “Where Hungary has provided a poetry to match the iconoclasm of its language and history, so it has not forgotten to birth new voices that are not facsimiles of past greatness; but very much of their own age, representing that age as they live it. Ágnes Lehóczky has the rare gift of both instinct and consideration, sophistication and brevity. Her poetry is profound, yet earthen, it reaches and grips, it takes hold. She wields a philosophical assurance to match her multi-linguistic ambition and supersedes the irrelevancy of poetic orthodoxy for the all the right reasons – her poetry overwhelms posturing and poise with the kind of intellect that reassures and reminds, we are living in a time where poetry is not just thriving, it is necessary.”
Die een ding wat ‘n mens onmiddellik opval wanneer jy Lehóczky se gedigte lees, is die lang, uitgesponne aard daarvan, terwyl dit tog ook terselfdertyd besonder heg gestruktureerd is met ‘n besonderse beeldrykheid. Haar eie digkuns beaskryf sy soos volg: “I think one of the most fundamental elements of my poetry is the notion of “weaving” a seemingly endless string of associations which demands the reader therefore to “unravel” this on-going sequence in the mind. However, on one hand, this chain of imagery, this string or sequence of associations, I believe, must be, to some extent, logical, recognisable, “heuristic” in a sense; therefore, you may say it is controlled, rabid, or better to say, consciously “architectured,” so that the chain, or sequence itself actually can be disentangled, and simply, interpreted, and thus become “familiar” in one way or another. On the other hand, since, in my opinion, words are semantically semi-independent signs, they must be given a certain amount of freedom to flow in the direction they want to. Imagery, as the embodiment of one’s associations therefore, must be let free too. […] I tend to believe in “worn-out” ideas by which each word, despite being in one’s control, opens up to newer and newer semantic contents in the mind. I’d like to imagine the texture of poems as thick and complex texture of textiles, for example, or the complex strata of the architecture of a huge city, in which imagery, associations, or perhaps better to call them, certain patterns occur as repetitions and the variations of these repetitions. So the paradox of the “focussed air” and the “energy” may derive from the need to control these patterns and the energy which may originate from the fluidity of their own free mutation.”
Werklik ‘n fassinerende digter. As toegif plaas ek ‘n uittreksel uit die lang gedig “The parchment skin” hieronder. Die volledige gedig, en ook ander, kan hier op 3:AM Magazine se webblad gelees word.
***
Vanoggend is daar ‘n nuwe digstring deur Cas Vos om te lees, asook nuwe blog-inskrywings deur Leon Retief en Andries Bezuidenhout. Ten slotte vra ek groot askies dat die Nuuswekker en nuwe blikvangers op die hoofblad so laat geplaas word vanoggend. Ons ondervind tans egter probleme ten opsigte van internet-toegang. Dit is weens herstelwerk wat aan die ondersese kabels gedoen word. Volgens MWeb gaan die probleem nog vir sowat ‘n week duur; so – wees dus maar geduldig wanneer dinge nie so glad verloop soos ‘n mens dit graag sou wou hê nie, asseblief.
Mooi bly.
LE
Cities don’t leave, they stay. They don’t.
They travel in sunburnt parchments. In
sand grains. In the vertigo of the sea. In
the shell of the crab crawling to and fro.
In your hand crawling to and fro.
Rotating. The way you drag its empty
body around carving circles in the sand.
The resemblance dizzies me. The likeness
between the cocoon and the body that is
gone. The similarity between the live and
the dead. Importunate sea gulls in the
North wind. Fishing in the air. Circulating
above us. They come almost too close to
my face, as if they were, in fact, fishing
for faces, fishing for hair, fishing for skin.
Fishing for shadows and for ghosts. For
holes in pebbles. Impromptu absences
washed out by the tide, sucked back into
no-time.
© Ágnes Lehóczky (Uit: The Parchment Skin)
