Monday, November 23, 2009

Yuri Andrukhovych | "(Rib)"




I'd donate my rib
to the anatomy room.

The enormous hearts of butchers and paramours are there,
the flabby and puffed up lungs of smokers,
trumpeners and glass-blowers,
a forlorn drunkard's guts,
the tatooed badge of a hero (right above the nipple)
and the hands of the last executioner
after a twelth conviction...
Not a word mentioned about other products.

I'd donate my rib.

Perhaps something would come out of it -
a certain fish,
or a woman,
or a branch
of a forgotten tree
a ginkgo.

Translated from Ukrainian by Ostap Kin


*

The poem (Rib) is part of Yuri Andrukhovych's cycle "The Notes of Traveler in July", which is included into his collection of poems Exotic Birds and Plants (Ivano-Frankivsk, 1997).

*

I have translated all seven poems which form this cycle. Does anyone know a literary magazine which would be interested in translated Ukrainian poetry and where it is possible to publish all seven poems?


*

Yuri Andrukhovych is a poet, writer, essayist and translator. His latest book in English is The Moscoviad (Spuyten Duyvil Press, 2008), translated from Ukrainian by Vitaly Chernetsky.

1 comment: