Translations: Mateo Morrison

Mateo Morrison
One of the books I picked up during my recent trip to the International Book Fair in Santo Domingo was a fascinating slender, double, or flip, volume, which featured Dominican author Mateo Morrison's book of poems Dorothy Dandridge on one side, and on the other a collection of writings about him, edited by Adrián Javier, entitled Del Verso a la Fragua: Mateo Morrison en Persona y Obra (Santo Domingo: Publicacions de la Universidad Autónoma de Santo Domingo, 2006).

Morrison (1947-, pictured above at left with Angela Oisteanu, Director of Public Relations for the Romanian Cultural Institute and Coördinator of the International Gathering of Poets of the Latin World Ars Amandi, Listín Diario) is a major figure in Dominican letters and longtime literary activist. He founded the literary group "La Antorcha" (The Torch), and the noted Taller César Vallejo (Cesar Vallejo Workshop), and for many years was editor of the literary supplement Aquí (Here), which appeared in the La Notícia newspaper. Morrison currently is director of the Arts and Cultural Programs Department at the Autonomous University of Santo Domingo. In addition to several volumes of poems, including the highly regarded collections Aniversario del dolor (1973, Anniversary of Pain) and Visiones del transeúnte (1985, The Transient's Visions), several critical texts, and a novel, Un silencio que camina (2006, A Traveling Silence).

Here are my draft translations of five of Morrison's poems from Dorothy Dandridge. All of the poems in the brief volume are brief, none longer than 10 lines, and their dreamlike flow and concision presents a challenge. Though Morrison's earlier poetry gained acclaim for its formal openness and lyricism, the compression of the Spanish, which I think may mirror the constraints of Dandridge's life itself and its silences, both seemed to push me towards more English words, so to render the idea fully, and yet to restrain myself in order to evoke the poems' terse and charged expressivity.

Cinco poemas de Mateo Morrison
del libro de poesía Dorothy Dandridge

Dorothy escuchaba los ecos del have dream Mientras los blacks panters Apuñalaban el cielo En las calles de Harlem *** Aquí la esperan aves Que saludan la noche Rostros desconocidos Profundizan el vacío *** Bella con sus aretes enormes Blusa negra y una flor en las manos Ojos inquisidores, una leve sonrisa Dorothy representaba sobre su piel los dioses tutelares De toda la africanía *** Recorro sonámbulo los caminos Donde debió pasar Hago siluetas en las arenas En que quizás depositó sus pies *** Toco las huellas Que dejó en múltiples aceras Me inclino en las iglesias y le dejo oraciones Copyright © Mateo Morrison, 2006

Dorothy was listening to the echoes Of "I Have a Dream" While the Black Panthers stabbed the sky In the streets of Harlem *** Here birds await her Those that greet the night Unfamiliar faces Peer deep into the emptiness *** Beautiful with her enormous earrings Black blouse and a flower in her hands Eyes inquisitive, a tender smile Dorothy represented on her skin The tutelary deities Of all Africana *** I pass like a sleepwalker through the very streets That she must have passed through I create silhouettes in the sands In which, perhaps, she placed her feet *** I touch the footprints That she left on multiple sidewalks I bend down in churches And offer her my devotions Draft translations by John Keene, 2006