Mantis 19 (Spring 2020)
New Poetry
Gemma Gorga
translated from the Catalan by Sharon Dolin
L’escena Transcorre Sense So
com si haguéssim franquejat la pantalla
i despertéssim en una pel·lícula
dels anys muts:
quan tot just
entra la protagonista
—cara enfarinada
i levita negra—
i arrossega la falç
contra el mur
d’acer
de casa nostra.
I el xerric que no se sent
resulta insuportable a les oïdes.
The Scene Happens Without Sound
as if we had crossed the screen
and woken up in a movie
from the silent era:
when all of a sudden
the protagonist enters—
with his face powdered,
wearing a black frock coat—
and drags the sickle
against the steel wall
of our house.
And the unheard screech
becomes unbearable to our ears.
A L’Hivern
s’estrenyen els colors
i l’aire és una mitja negra
per on ascendeixen
espesses
les últimes flors
que encara
vas ser a temps
de pronunciar.
Elles,
amb el seu calendari atapeït
de núvies i difunts.
In Winter
colors constrict
and the air—a black stocking
through which there ascend
thickened
the last flowers
you were still
on time
to pronounce.
They
with their tight schedules
of brides and the deceased.
GEMMA GORGA was born in Barcelona in 1968. She holds a Ph.D. in Philology from the University of Barcelona, where she teaches Medieval and Renaissance Literature. She has published seven books of poetry since 1997, most recently Mur (Barcelona: Meteora, 2015) and Viatge al centre (Barcelona: Godall Edicions, 2020). While not overtly political, Gorga’s poetry is inherently political by virtue of the fact that Gorga always writes in Catalan—a language that has a long history of being suppressed and declared illegal by those in power. Gorga is a cosmopolitan writer, who has said she draws on influences local and worldwide.
SHARON DOLIN is the author of six books of poetry, most recently Manual for Living (University of Pittsburgh Press, 2016). A 2021 recipient of an NEA Fellowship in Translation and the winner of the inaugural Malinda A. Markham Memorial Prize in Translation, her translation of Late to the House of Words: Selected Poems of Gemma Gorga is forthcoming from Saturnalia Books in the fall of 2021. She is also the author of a book of translations from Catalan, Book of Minutes by Gemma Gorga (Oberlin College Press, 2019) and a prose memoir, Hitchcock Blonde (Terra Nova Press, 2020). She is Associate Editor at Barrow Street Press and directs Writing About Art in Barcelona.