Three Stars / Drei Sterne

August 9, 2017 ~ Christina Egan ~ Leave a comment

Three Stars

Three stars in the sky…
Three lines only to tell you
all my hopes for us.

Sneeze

Your sweet face – a sneeze –
as sudden and explosive
as your sweet haiku.

Drei Sterne

Drei Sterne am Himmel…
Drei Zeilen für dich, für
all meine Hoffnung.

Nieser

Dein liebes Gesicht
– ein Nieser – plötzlich, heftig,
wie deine Haikus!

A haiku is a Japanese poetic form; each poem has only three lines and seventeen syllables, which amounts sometimes to only a dozen words, even with a title. Yet you can say a lot in three lines… The word game is more difficult in German than in English, since the words are longer; translation can be a challenge.

A traditional haiku starts with an image from nature indicating the season; you will see on my haiku pages that I largely follow this rule. These here are different: one is simply romantic and one humorous, and both are about reading and hearing haiku!

Illustration: Stamp of 1963. (Scanned by Darjac) [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons.

Kirchenkonzert / Church Concert

June 6, 2017 ~ Christina Egan ~ Leave a comment

Joint 100th English and 100th German post!

Kirchenkonzert

Ein Dom mit hohen grauen Fensterscheiben
und berstend bunten um den Pfeilerreigen –
und alles, alles aus Musik!
Und unerreichbar fern, unsterblich stark
du stille dunkelblaue Gegenwart,
du mein Geheimnis, mein Geschick.

Church Concert

A dance of pillars round the sacred site;
round them, tall windows, grey or burning bright –
and all is made of music, melody!
Unreachable, immortal and immense,
a tranquil deep-blue presence grows more dense:
it’s you, my secret, you, my destiny.

Find more poems about the power of music at Quest / Suche and Auf dem Purpurteppich / On the royal-purple rug.

There are fewer than 200 posts of poetry here, since some show parallel or similar poems in two languages (and some are in French), but almost 300 poems.

Prophet Hosea, window in Augsburg Cathedral, around 1100 (!). Photograph: Hans Bernhard (Schnobby) (Own work) CC BY-SA 3.0 or GFDL, via Wikimedia Commons. — Astronomical clock with carillon playing hymns (20th c.). Marienkirche, Lübeck, Germany. Photograph: Christina Egan © 2014.

Jetzt und jenseits / Now and Beyond

April 20, 2017 ~ Christina Egan ~ Leave a comment

Jetzt und jenseits

In der Stille, in der Helle,
wo die Kerze steht und blüht
oder Welle über Welle,
Wolke über Wolke zieht,

in der Stille, in der Hülle
des Gewölbes oder Walds
quillt der Friede, quillt die Fülle
jetzt und jenseits unsres Alls.

Now and Beyond

In the stillness, in the light,
where the candle blossoms bright
or where wave flows after wave,
cloud on cloud and breeze on breeze,

in the stillness, in the cave
of the vault or wooded pond
flows the fullness, flows the peace
of the now and the beyond.

In the Hebrew bible, ‘peace’ (‘shalom’) is defined ex positivo, as it should be, not ex negativo: it means abundance and fulfilment, not absence of war or conflict.

Similarly, in the Christian tradition, ‘quiet’, ‘silence’, ‘solitude’ often imply awareness, peace of mind, presence of God, rather than absence of sound or lack of company.

Suburban traffic jam / Vorstadtstau

April 11, 2017 ~ Christina Egan ~ 1 Comment

Suburban traffic jam

It’s raining, the traffic is creeping,
the morning is seeping away…
The bus windows seem to be weeping
at boundless suburban grey.

Yet should a grenade or a comet
now strike us, as if to sift –
I’d meet my death as a poet,
I’ve smiled and I’ve breathed and I’ve lived!

Vorstadtstau

Es regnet… Minuten verrinnen
im Vorstadtstau, Stoßzeitstau…
Die Autobusfenster verschwimmen
im uferlos traurigen Grau.

Und sollte der Tod uns jetzt lichten
– Granate oder Komet –
so hab’ ich gelächelt, gedichtet,
so hab’ ich geatmet, gelebt!

These thoughts came to me on a bus near the spot in London where a man was shot dead by gangsters in 2015; no one has been charged with the crime. In 2016, another man was shot dead nearby by police. Later that year, another man was stabbed to death just down the road, near Wood Green Station.

Moreover, many terrorist attacks have happened in Europe, and many more have been prevented in London alone; but more are bound to afflict us.

Le tesson / The Shard

March 2, 2017 ~ Christina Egan ~ Leave a comment

Le tesson

En février givré, je fouille
les feuilles mortes pour des fleurs
modestes et fortes et courageuses :
soldats contre la froideur

ou des pierres précieuses
éparpillées en bas, fragments
pâlis de la Cité Céleste
que quelques éblouis attestent.

Parfois, une sphère lumineuse
me frappe, vive mais tranquille :
plutôt que le premier bouton
ton œil est le tesson qui brille.

The Shard

In frosty February, I scour
decaying leaves for the first flower:
some modest soldiers, strong and bold
against the kingdom of the cold,

or precious stones on muddy ground,
some faded fragments of the round
of Heavenly Jerusalem,
that dazzling more-than-real realm.

At times a circle full of light,
as calm as lively, strikes my sight:
but rather than spring’s early guard
your eye is the resplendent shard.

For a German and English parallel poem about the first spring flowers, go to my previous post, King Spring / König Frühjahr.

Photograph: Christina Egan © 2017.
Crocusses with honey-bee, captured in London in mid-February!

King Spring / König Frühjahr

February 22, 2017 ~ Christina Egan ~ Leave a comment

King Spring

The highway under my window is suddenly flooded with sun.
I see a strange person passing – his face is greenish and long,
his hat is purple and pointed – and followers thronging, hatless.
Is it a pharaoh? A druid? A dancer in fancy-dress?
I’ve spotted a spearhead of petals, magenta pushed up into blue,
the first magnolia flower: King Spring and his retinue!

König Frühjahr

Die Landstraße unter dem Fenster liegt plötzlich im Sonnenlicht.
Da geht ein fremder Geselle mit grünlichem langem Gesicht
und purpurner spitzer Mütze; Barhäuptige folgen ihm.
Ein Pharaoh? Heidenpriester? Ein Tänzer im Narrenkostüm?
Es ist eine Lanzenspitze, rosenrot hochgereckt,
die erste Magnolienblüte: Ich hab’ König Frühjahr entdeckt!

Palmenhaus / Palm House

Bright red koi fish coming out from underneath curved green bridge across pond

December 27, 2016April 19, 2024 ~ Christina Egan ~ Leave a comment

250 poems!

Palmenhaus am Wolfsweg –
Palm House at Wolves Lane

Sattgrüne Segel,
wölben sich die Palmblätter
hier im Gewächshaus.

Green sails, filled with light,
with sap, the palm leaves billow
here in the greenhouse.

***

Blütentrompeten
antworten dem Wasserfall:
Kannst du’s vernehmen?

The flutes of flowers
answering the waterfall:
can you perceive it?

***

Dieser Tümpel ist
dem Schöpfer ein Tropfen,
der Schildkröte die Welt.

This round pond is
a drop to the Creator,
the world to the turtle.

***

Im schwarzen Wasser
das Spiegelspiel des Himmels,
der Blitz des Goldfischs.

In the black water
quivering of heavens,
lightning of a goldfish.

***

Aus nachtgleichem Naß
unter der grünen Brücke
schießt der rote Fisch.

From the night-like wet,
from under the bright-green bridge
the red fish shoots out.

***

Quest / Suche

December 12, 2016April 20, 2024 ~ Christina Egan ~ Leave a comment

Quest

The market swirls
like ocean’s foam –
The harbour bursts
to roam the blue –

Yet nothing’s real
if not dream –
And music too –
and music too!

Suche

Der Marktplatz quirlt
wie Wellenschaum –
der Hafen quillt
hinaus ins Glück –

Doch nichts ist wirklich
als der Traum –
und die Musik –
und die Musik!

This poem in German and English versions is dedicated to the painter Curt Echtermeyer, who for some of his work took on the pseudonym Curt Bruckner out of reverence for the composer Anton Bruckner. I hope Curt would appreciate the thought that dreams are more real than life…

Images: Das Fest des Lebens (The Feast of Life) by Curt Echtermeyer. Pastel, 1970. With thanks to Archiv Klaus Spermann. — Max Ernst: Fish fight. Oil on canvas, 1917. – © Max Ernst. Distributed under FairUse at WikiArt.

gesternmuster / Zeit-Räume

September 15, 2016February 11, 2017 ~ Christina Egan ~ Leave a comment

gesternmuster
(Knossos)

die kolossalen säulen
der stolzen pinien
jener erhabene baldachin
der schutz vor der sonnenflut bietet

die schwarzen weißen blutroten pfeiler
im heiteren palastlabyrinth
jene flecke in einem gesternmuster
das jahrtausendealt ist

—

This is a translation of The pattern of a yesterday . At that post, you can find some photos and a link to an artistic impression of the palace 3,500 years ago.

Photograph: Minoan beads from Crete in gold, lapis lazuli, cornelian, ca. 1700-1500 BC. – © The Trustees of the British Museum.

—

Zeit-Räume
(Knossos)

Terrassen, Treppen, rote Säulen
zwischen himmelhohen Bäumen,
Marmorschwellen, rote Wände,
um die Ecken neue Treppen…

Wie im Traume muß man wandern
durch die Höfe, durch die Säle,
durch die Wärme, durch die Kühle,
still von einem Raum zum andern…

Schlanke Bäume, schlanke Menschen
stehn vor heitrem Himmel drinnen
in den buntbemalten Zimmern
heute wie vor tausend Jahren.

Keine Läden vor den Fenstern,
in den Türen keine Flügel,
keine Grenzen zwischen Innen,
Außen, Unten oder Oben,

keine Pforten zwischen Heute,
Gestern oder Vorvorgestern
zwischen einem bunten Zeit-Raum
unter Pinien und dem andern.

Views of North Sea Islands

July 11, 2016February 11, 2017 ~ Christina Egan ~ Leave a comment

Views of North Sea Islands – Ansichten von Nordseeinseln

Thick patches of moss
clustering on rippled thatch
like verdant islands,
like the islands we stand on:
growing in the rough grey sea.

Dicke Moospolster
auf dem welligen Reetdach,
gleich grünen Inseln,
gleich diesen Inseln hier,
wachsend im wilden grauen Meer.

Red clover blossom:
tiny magenta lanterns
in the green and blue,
feeding on the salty floods
across these flat floating disks.

Rosaroter Klee:
winzige Laternen
in all dem Grün und Blau,
genährt von Salzfluten
über schwebende Scheiben hin.

Huge ships approaching,
or space-ships – or are they hills,
or houses on stilts?
They are houses, hamlets, islets…
a necklace of glass beads.

Da – Riesenschiffe –
Raumschiffe – oder Hügel,
Häuser auf Stelzen?
Häuser, Dörfchen, Inselchen…
eine Glasperlenkette.

From the flat, small, oval island of Föhr, you spot the even flatter, even smaller islands known as ‘Halligen’: their clusters of houses and trees on little dells are visible on the horizon far across the ocean.

The Halligen still get regularly flooded and are occasionally menaced by devastation. All these islands change shape over time, when the forces of wind and water eat away at their edges or add new land.

I wrote about a similar phenomenon observed on the Baltic Sea island of the Darss in Schöpfung (Darß).

	Christina Egan on schweben und leben…
	Bruce Wu on schweben und leben…
	payoli on Die vierte Frucht
	M.W. on Schläft ein Lied / Sleeping…
	Cari Harris on A Window will be Thrust O…

Christina Egan

Poetry & Plays – Dichtung & Drama

Parallel Poems