Three Poems by Baiba Bičole, translated from Latvian by Bitite Vinklers
I exist outside of time
I exist outside of time.
You open the door, and beneath your bare feet
crunches glass, wind rushes
into your eyes. You open your hands,
and husks and ashes dance
in an unending chain.
We exist outside of time.
We are thresholds
neither for leaving,
nor returning.
I look nonbeing in the eye,
and I behold my twin.
—es ārpus laika esmu.
Tu paver durvis, stikli čirkstot
saņem tavas basās pēdas,
tev plakstos triecas vējš, tu atver saujas,
un sēnalas un pelni dejo
vītnē bezgalīgā, sausā straumē
džinkstot tev caur pirkstiem
dzelzu meitas stingie mati
sitas, dzirkstis šķilot.
—Mēs ārpus laika esam,
ne aiziešanai esam sliekšņi,
ne pārnākšanai esam.
Es skatos nebūtībai tieši acīs
un redzu savu dvīni.
through the heavy stone wall
Squeezing through the heavy stone wall,
sound grows thinner and thinner,
until it breaks in two,
and my lips press against the wall
like the proclamation
of a long-ago event.
Biezajiem mūriem cauri spraucoties,
skaņa arvienu tievāka izdilst,
līdz pārlūst pavisam,
un manas lūpas pielīp pie sienas
kā sludinājums
sen pagājušam notikumam.
In the vastness between us
In the vastness between us,
I hollowed a place
for a sea.
I waited for the heavens to open,
I waited for a wondrous flood
to fill the hollow
with waters, deeps,
terrible
waves.
It all came to pass.
And we? —You and I, from our separate shores,
walked across the waters to meet
in mid-sea.
—jau izraku vietu jūrai
starp mums,
gaidīju debesis atveŗamies,
gaidīju milzīgus plūdus, kam
piepildīt izrakto vietu
ar ūdeņiem, dzelmēm,
viļņiem
briesmīgiem.
Tas viss notika.
Un mēs? —Katrs no sava krasta
pār ūdeņiem gājām,
vidū jūras
satikāmies.
Born in Latvia, Baiba Bičole left as a refugee during World War II, and since 1950 has lived in the United States. A prominent Latvian poet since the 1970s, until Latvia regained its independence in 1991, she was known primarily in the West, as an exile poet, her work being banned in Latvia during the Soviet occupation. She is the author of six volumes of poetry and has received major Latvian literary awards.
Bitite Vinklers is a translator of Latvian folklore and contemporary literature. Her translations have appeared in numerous anthologies and journals, among them The Paris Review, Kenyon Review, and The Massachusetts Review. Recent translation collections include Imants Ziedonis, Each Day Catches Fire: Poems (Red Dragonfly Press, 2015), and Knuts Skujenieks, Seed in Snow: Poems (BOA Editions, 2016).
