მაისის თაფლი May Honey

მაისის თაფლი

რა ადვილია რომ მიყვარდე
ანუ მაგრად მოვმუწო პირი
რომ ჩემს მუცელში მოზუზუნე
მუშა ფუტკრებმა
არ შეგატოვონ ფაქიზი და მყიფე ნესტარი,
მიყვარდე, ნიშნავს, რომ დაგიცვა
ჩემი კოცნისგან.
 
რა ადვილია, რომ მიყვარდე
კანის ფორებში – ფიჭის უჯრებში
გამოვჩეკო თბილი ჭუპრები:
შეხება
სუნი
მახსოვრობა
ჩვევა
შეჩვევა –
დავაფრთიანო
მოგცე სხვასთან ყოფნის უფლება.
 
რა ადვილია რომ მიყვარდე,
ყოველ დილით დავუხშო ბაგე
უსქესო ფუტკრებს
- შთაგონების მუშა ქალწულებს
მტვრითა და ცვილით ამოვლესო
ჩემი სკის კარი
მიყვარდე – ნიშნავს იყო შორს და
ჩემგან დაცული.
რა ადვილია, როგორც ოქროს მიწაში დაფლვა,
არადა ისე უმიზეზოდ დამწიფდა თაფლი.
 
შენ ხარ აქამდე
 

May Honey

How easy it is to love you -
in other words, to seal my lips
so that the worker bees
can't leave their tender sting
in my stomach.
To love you means to protect you
from my kiss.
 
How easy it is to love you -
in each pore of my skin;
to hatch the warm chrysalis
in each cell of the honeycomb.
Touch, smell, memory, habit, familiarity -
to give wings to them all,
to give you the right to be with another.
 
How easy it is to love you -
to seal the mouth
of the sexless bees each morning
(those virgin muses)
to block with dust and dew
the opening of my beehive.
For me to love you,
you must stay at a distance,
protected from me -
easy as burying gold in the ground.
But honey is here without any reason.
And so are you.
 
 

The May Honey

How easy it is to love you
In other words to clench my mouth
So that in my stomach
The working bees
Would not leave a tender and fragile sting,
To love you means to defend( protect) you
From my kiss.
 
How easy it is to love you
With the pores of my skin- in the cells of the honeycomb
To hatch the warm chrysalis:
Touching,
Smell,
Memory,
Habit,
Getting used to-
To wing ( to give wings to all of them) them all
To give you the right to be with somebody else.
 
How easy it is to love you,
To  suppress ( to block) the mouth
To the sexless bees every morning
To the virgins of the inspiration
To dumb (to fill it up) with dust and dew
The door of my beehive
To love you means for you to be far
  Protected from me.
And it is as easy as  burying the gold in  the earth,
But honey has ripened without any reason.
You still exist ( you are still)
 

Translating this beautiful, delicate poem was such a pleasure and we all felt pleased with the results. As with any translation, we found some phrases – often those that might seem to be the simplest – hard to get into English. We pondered over how to render ‘to give you the right to be with another’ which sounds rather bald in English, but is clearly exactly what the poet means, and so we left it as it is.

If you compare Natalia’s literal version with our final poem, you will see that we’ve had to reorder the syntax in places and we’ve altered some of the line breaks.

Sarah Maguire, Workshop Facilitator

Original Poem by

Diana Anphimiadi

Translated by

Natalia Bukia-Peters with The Poetry Translation Workshop Language

Georgian

Country

Georgia