Welcome To Whole Food ‘Welcome to Whole Food’

Welcome To Whole Food

Está bien. La semilla es la semilla.
Los hongos y las algas, Christian Dior.
El aceite de sésamo, señor,
para hacer un pescado a la parrilla.
 
Todo encaja. De quinoa la tortilla.
Fruta y queso. Gusano en coliflor.
Nada tiene sabor a otro sabor.
Yo brillo porque adentro maíz brilla.
 
No poema. No música. No cine.
No teatro. Ninguna arquitectura.
A llenar lo vacío solo vine.
 
Y vacía seré. Porque hermosura
solo habrá cuando inmóvil adivine
la respuesta del hambre en la escritura.
 

‘Welcome to Whole Food’

Fine, so a seed is a seed.
Mushrooms and Seaweed, Christian Dior.
Sesame oil, señor,
for searing fish on the grill.
 
Everything has its place. Quinoa tortillas.
Fruit and cheese. Maggot in cauliflower.
Nothing is flavoured with another flavour.
I shine because corn shines inside.
 
No poem. No music. No cinema.
No theatre. Not even architecture.
I only came to fill what’s empty.
 
And I will be empty. Because beauty
will only exist when I stop to write
and listen for hunger’s answer.
 

Welcome To Whole Food

It’s good. A seed is a seed.
The mushrooms and the seaweeds, Christian Dior.
The sesame oil, sir,
for make a fish on the grill.
 
Everything fits in. Of quinoa the tortilla.
Fruit and cheese. Maggot in cauliflower.
Nothing has flavour of other flavour.
I shine because inside corn shines.
 
No poem. No music. No cinema.
No theatre. No architecture.
To fill the emptiness only I came.
 
And empty I will be. Because beauty
only will be when immobile guess
the answer of the hunger in the writing.
 
​
 

Our literal translator, Serafina Vick, began by telling us a little about Legna Rodriguez Iglesias’ collection, the rather wonderfully titled Miami Century Fox, which this poem comes from – a sequence of sonnets written in response to the disorientating experience of moving from Cuba to Miami for love. We decided to translate this poem first because it really captures that sense of encountering America in all its strangeness. Whole Foods is a very expensive organic supermarket, and this sonnet feels full of ambiguities – both drawn to the shop’s high-end purity and able to see its absurdity. It’s so natural there’s even ‘maggot in cauliflower’ and so holier-than-thou the sweetcorn gives you a halo.

We struggled most over the last sentence, which the literal rendered as ‘Because beauty only will be when immobile guess the answer of the hunger in the writing’. ‘Writing’ felt like a bit of a flat ending, compared to the original ‘escritura’ – after all the ‘r’ rhymes and half-rhymes (Dior, senor, Quinoa tortilla, cauliflower, flavour, cinema, theatre, architecture, hunger) it felt like we needed another one to snap the poem shut, so after much arranging and rearranging of the sense, we went with ‘answer’ to finish.

Clare Pollard

Original Poem by

Legna Rodríguez Iglesias

Translated by

Serafina Vick with The Poetry Translation Workshop Language

Spanish

Country

Cuba