Versindaba kompetisie vir vertaalde gedigte (61)
Gregory Orr. Vertaling van Engels in Afrikaans. Vert. deur Johann de Lange.
Na ‘n dood
Ek het die voordeur toe hoor gaan
en deur die ruit my pa
oor die maanverligte gras sien loop
en óp met die pad na die boord.
En meteens was ek by hom
my hand met handskoen wat aan syne klou,
en Pieter, my broer, sy gestorwe seun,
het sy ander hand vasgehou.
Ons manier van loop
was ‘n volgehoue soort verdriet.
Koue Novembernag;
al verder weg het ons geloop
oor die verlate paaie
sonder om ooit terug te draai
na die warm huis so helder verlig
met onuitspreeklike smart.
08.08.1998
***
After a death
Gregory Orr
I heard the front door close
and from my window I saw
my father cross the moonlit lawn
and start walking up the orchard road.
And then I was with him,
my mittened hand clinging to his,
and Peter, my brother, his dead son,
was holding his other hand.
The way the three of us walked
was a kind of steady weeping.
Cold, November night,
we walked on and on
over the empty roads
and we never turned back
toward the warm house that was all lit up
with impossible sorrow.
Bronverwysing:
Orr, Gregory. 2002. The Caged Owl: New and Selected Poems. Port Townsend, WA: Copper Canyon Press. ISBN: 1-55659-177-2