A tiny, bittersweet poem about the passing of time, we had attempted to translate this in our workshop a year ago but failed to complete it. The seasons having turned, we were glad to finally get it finished a year later. Alireza’s literal translation needed minimal intervention in the end – we loved the sounds of trinket/waistcoat/pocket and the phrase ‘overcoat’s buttons’ (making it sound like they belong to the overcoat, rather than the overcoat belongs to the speaker). The last line was clunky and needed paring back though – workshop participant Khairani Barokka’s excellent suggestion solved our problems, as replacing ‘opportunity’ with ‘chance’ gave the same positive sense but saved us 4 syllables!
Clare Pollard, Poet-facilitator