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Christine Rhein: Uncharted Waters
a remix of fragments by Archilochus (690-645 BC),
as translated by Guy Davenport in Carmina Archilochi
Heavy and high buckles the sea.
We complain / we blame.
This is no time for poetry.
Torn by perplexity /
the captains ram and rage.
Heavy and high buckles the sea.
O forsaken / society.
Greed / storm / day after day.
This is no time for poetry.
Heart and what / destiny?
Chatter / in time of shame.
Heavy and high buckles the sea.
Birdnests / plums / in jeopardy.
Lives in the arms of the waves.
This is no time for poetry.
Honor / confusion / calamity.
Tears cannot drive misery away.
Heavy and high buckles the sea.
This is no time for poetry?
~~~~
Copyright 2020 Christine Rhein. First published in Panoply.
Christine Rhein, a prize-winning poet and a former auto engineer, is the author of
Wild Flight, (Texas Tech University Press).
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Stunning.
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I’m with Sean. This masterful poem makes me want to try the form again. This is one I want to post somewhere to soak it in.
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Such intense emotion and truths in this poem. Bravo Christibe!
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Forgive my 6am clumsy fingers, Christine. Although “christibe” sounds like the name of a rare flower, don’t you agree?! “She carried a small bouquet of perfect pink christibes…”
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I’m smiling! Believe it or not, I have a line in a poem that says “Christine is a rare blue flower” (a self-portrait poem). 🙂
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I always picture myself as kale: bitter but very good for you if you can stomach it.
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🤪😂🤣
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A great neologism is a gift from the universe disguised as a mistake.
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Thank you, Laure-Anne!
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Those ancient Greeks have so much to teach us. What a love rendering.
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PS: Is there a a more wonderful thing than Guy Davenport’s little monograph on Balthus? (Since we invoked his name as translator of the ingredients of the text?)
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What a fine, fine villanelle!
When they’re right, they underscore the world and its elements like no other form! Now I want to try again to write a good one!
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Thanks, Sean. I love Christine’s poems for their precision of language.
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