HILARY ELFICK

Moment of Birth


As if this were a normal birth he announced it,
laughing, so they all filled up their glasses
under sagging bougainvillea where
bleached butterflies were darting, hiding
from the mynahs’ shriek and clatter, and
the glasses clinked, the sky grew green,
and Brett came over, slapped him on the back
which meant they all uncorked more wine
while in that crowded, bubbled, lazy twilight
on our neighbour’s terrace I just stood there
seeing only this frail child, too light for life to bear
inside translucent skin too thin to take the
needles and the probes, her sticky mouth too
tiny for the finest filament of oxygen and
formula, and you there, you my darling child,
so drained, so pumped tight with your fresh
two-litred drip of borrowed blood, straining to
see her spread out flat through all that bottled glass,
so thick, so brittle and so crossed with
wires, she who should have been
too small to shout, but shout she did

before they swept her from your streaming thighs;
so Mark outside the unit strained his panicked ears,
trying to guess which one of you had cried
and whether either of you’d ever cry again
and then that short rush he had made to find
a phone and race like Puck a half way round the world
to say that she’d been born which then had made
your father come back out with sparkling wine,
lift up his laughing glass and no one under all those
crimson flowers, picking at fat oysters and hot
mussel fritters, stopped to ask why ever we were
laughing in December all those months too soon,
and whether it was safe to raise our glasses
to our end-of-day euphoria except that somehow
all she was, so tiny, so yet unreal, so unsure
of her next breath, still had the right, the right,
the right to such a celebration as this.

Roxana-Monica Mîndrican

Hilary Elfick
 

Momentul nasterii

De parca ar fi fost o nastere normala, el a anuntat-o,
razand, iar ei si-au umplut paharele
sub crengile de boungvillea* incovoiate de unde
au tasnit fluturi decolorati, ascunzandu-se de tipatul si clampanitul pasarilor mynahs*
si paharele s-au ciocnit, cerul s-a inverzit,
si Brett a venit, l-a batut pe spate
in semn ca au destupat mai multe multe sticle de vin,
in timp ce in acel amurg plin, spumos*, lenes
pe terasa vecinului nostru tocmai m-am asezat acolo
vazand doar acest copil plapand, prea fragil sa poata razbi in viata*
cu pielea-i transparenta prea slab sa indure
acele si examinarile, gura ei vascoasa prea
mica pentru cel mai fin firicel de oxygen si
formula, si tu acolo, tu, copilul meu drag,
atat de epuizat si sleit in urma celor doi litri
de sange imprumutat, sfortandu-te se
o vezi intinsa printre toate acele sticle pline,
atat de cleioasa*, fragila, si acoperita de
fire, ea care ar fi trebuit sa fie
prea mica sa tipe, si totusi a tipat
inainte ca ei sa o ia dintre coapsele tale revarsate;
Mark in fata unitatii si-a ciulit urechile panicate,
incercand sa ghiceasca care dintre voi a tipat
si daca vreuna dintre voi va mai tipa vreodata
si apoi a tasnit repede sa gaseasca
un telefon si asemeni lui Puck sa faca inconjurul lumii
sa spuna ca ea s-a nascut si astfel sa-l faca
pe tatal tau sa vina cu vinul spumos,
sa-si ridice paharul razand si nimeni sub toate acele
flori purpurii, mancand stridii grase si
midi prajite fierbinti, nu s-a oprit sa se intrebe de ce
radeam in decemebrie, cu atatea luni mai devreme,
si daca era bine sa ridicam paharele
in cinstea euforiei ce ne cupinsese la lasarea serii, doar daca
intr-un fel desi ea era atat de mica si ireala, cu viata-i
atarnand de un fir de ata*, avea totusi dreptul, dreptul
dreptul la o astefl desarbatoare.

*bougainvillea is a genus of flowering plants native to South America from Brazil west to Peru and south to southern Argentina (Chubut Province). Different authors accept between four and 18 species in the genus. The name comes from Louis Antoine de Bougainville, an admiral in the French Navy who discovered the plant in Brazil in 1768.They are thorny, woody, vines growing anywhere from 1-12 meters tall, scrambling over other plants with their hooked thorns. The thorns are tipped with a black, waxy substance. They are evergreen where rainfall occurs all year, or deciduous if there is a dry season.

*birds which occur naturally only in southern and eastern Asia. Several species have been introduced to areas like North America, Australia, South Africa and New Zealand, especially the Common Myna which is often regarded as an invasive species. Mynas are medium-sized passerines with strong feet. Their flight is strong and direct, and they are gregarious. Their preferred habitat is fairly open country, and they eat insects and fruit.

*“bubbled” – in the original text- I chose “spumos” because it could be associated with ‘bubbly’( bubbly champagne); it represents a metaphor of champagne and of celebration- given that the whole poem is somehow a celebration’, despite the sense of sadness and doubt which gives the event a certain negative connotation.

*”to light for life to bear” in the source text- “prea fragila sa poata razbi in viata” (to frail to survive/ to make her way in life) in my translation- I chose “fragila”(frail) for light because it emphasize this idea of frailty, of a being which is somehow seraphic and not suited for the harsh world. “a razbi” (to survive, to succed in smth) is a verb which in Romanian entails both the idea of survival and of struggle.
 

*“thick”- in the original text- could mean ‘dense’; ‘gluely’; ‘clammy’- I chose “cleioasa”(gummy/clammy) because it make us think of something which is not in a normal condition- or of something frail- like a sort of maggot which has just broke its chrysalid- this could be associated with ‘the moment of birth’.

*”so unsure of her next breath” vs “cu viata-i atarnand de un fir de ata” (her life hanging on a thread). I didn’ t chose a literal translation because the expression wouldn’t have sounded very natural in Romanian. I tried to find an equivalent expression which preserves the meaning and which is more appropriate in the Romanian translation