Louis Esterhuizen. ‘n Opwindende Filippynse digter …
Wednesday, November 23rd, 2011
Die digkuns van die Filippyne is nou nie juis een wat alte gereeld in die kalklig van die wêreldpoësie gemaak staan word nie. Daarom dat ek soort van met minimum verwagting die skakels by Asymptote Journal oopgemaak het toe ek sien dat hulle met hul nuutste uitgawe op ‘n aantal Filippynse digters fokus. En ja, daar trek die naam Allan Popa my aandag, want met ‘n van soos dáái verdien jy darem waaragtig ‘n nadere betragting. (Toegegee, dis nou natuurlik omrede die Serwiese digter, Vasko Popa (1922 – 1991), dekades reeds ‘n persoonlike gunstelingdigter is.)
En watter verrassing! Inderdaad ‘n besonderse digter …
Allan Popa het tot dusver sewe digbundels gepubliseer met Basta (Ateneo de Manila University Press, 2009) en Maaari: Mga Bago at Piling Tula (University of the Philippines Press, 2004) as die mees onlangses. Sy werk is reeds met Philippines Free Press Literary Award bekroon en hy het twee keer die Manila Critics Circle National Book Award ontvang vir Morpo in 2001 en Samsara in 2002. Hy is tans dosent by sowel die Ateneo de Manila Universiteit as die De La Salle Universiteit.
Graag plaas ek twee van sy verse hieronder. “Imago” is deur Jose Perez Beduya in samewerking met die digter vertaal en “Tongues of Angels” deur Jose Edmundo Ocampo Reyes. Op Asymptote Journal se webtuiste is daar nog enkele ander verse van die digter met die glorieryke van.
Lekker lees.
***
Imago
The insects know.
Theirs the numberless proof.
Therefore true.
They who cloak the noon
Of explanation.
Numberless wing-shadow.
What ripeness is.
In air, inhering.
A-hum.
Scatter a fistful.
Stare at small hands
In gloom.
(lacking)
Dissolving before touching earth.
(gravity’s roost)
A kind of hunger.
From arid ground, bodies
Mounting each other.
Scales peeling off tight coils.
Afterwards, a breeding swarm.
(droning)
Pregnant wave parched from cresting.
(brief lives, murmuring)
Amounting-to, mounting, surmounting.
No surface scarring over.
No remains remaining.
***
Tongues of Angels
They unfold their wings.
The shadows they create
Fail to darken the earth.
They watch.
Without once batting an eye.
Without once turning their backs.
Without once shielding
Their faces with hands
They cannot lift from their trumpets.
Sometimes they are visited by the memory
Of voice. They long to open their mouths.
But cannot speak.
What is a tongue if not a piece
Of flesh that can never be swallowed.
© Allan Popa
