Poem ‘A Question of Lust’ translated by Lupita Eyde-Tucker

By Stephanie Philp and Oriette D’Angelo

Question of Lust

Every thought that persists is contradiction.
Marcel Schwob

We are made of fissures
we throw rocks at the houses
question our own courage
accumulating the experience of a back alley knife

We name each other like streets
remember each other like seasons
like stages that never end

Painful footsteps
souvenirs that erase the memory of my feet
the one of the stumbling / the one of the mistakes
the one of the slight hole in my back

You persist to contradict me
persist like Depeche Mode singing to me on the radio

It’s a question of not letting
what we’ve built up
crumble to dust

Bad memory is your stronghold
you persist in me like a contradiction
like an earthquake

I cannot feel

You persist in me
like fire that creates chaos in the south
and makes me breathe smoke in the north

And still you condemn me to exile
from a body I don’t touch
in a country that distracts me

We play hide and seek

one

two

three

and make no effort to find each other.

Cuestión de lujuria

Todo pensamiento que perdura es contradicción.
Marcel Schwob

Estamos hechos de fisuras
lanzamos piedras a las casas
cuestionamos nuestra valentía
acumulando la experiencia de un cuchillo callejero

Nos nombramos como calles
nos recordamos como épocas
como etapas que no acaban

Duelen los pasos
los recuerdos que me quitan la memoria de los pies
la de los tropiezos / la de los errores
la del orificio leve de la espalda

Perduras para contradecirme
perduras como Depeche Mode cantándome en la radio:

It’s a question of not letting
what we’ve built up
crumble to dust

La mala memoria es tu fortaleza
me perduras como una contradicción
como el temblor de tu tierra

que no siento

me perduras
como el incendio que hace caos en el sur
y me hace sentir el humo en el norte

Aun así me condenas al exilio
de un cuerpo que no toco
en un pais que me distrae

Jugamos al escondite

uno

dos

tres

y no hay propósito para encontrarnos

About the translator

Lupita Eyde-Tucker

Lupita Eyde-Tucker writes and translates poetry in English and Spanish, is the winner of the 2019 Betty Gabehart Prize for Poetry, and a Fellow at The Watering Hole. Her work has appeared in Nashville Review, SWWIM, The Florida Review, Baltimore Review, The Acentos Review, Asymptote, and is forthcoming in The Arkansas International. She’s currently translating two collections of poetry by Venezuelan poet Oriette D’Angelo, and lives with her husband and five children in Florida. Read more of her poems at: www.NotEnoughPoetry.com

About the author

Oriette D'Angelo

Oriette D’Angelo (Caracas, 1990) is currently an MFA candidate in Creative Writing in Spanish at the University of Iowa. She is the editor of the literary magazine Digo.palabra.txt and of the research and broadcasting project #PoetasVenezolanas. She has a Masters Degree in Digital Communication and Media Arts from DePaul University, Chicago. She is the author of the collection Cardiopatías (Monte Ávila Editores, 2016; Winner of the Emerging Writers Prize, 2014). Edited and wrote the prologue for the anthology of Venezuelan poetry Amanecimos sobre la palabra (Team Poetero Ediciones,  2017). In 2015 she obtained second place in the I Concurso de Crónicas de la Fundación Seguros Caracas, and in 2016 won third place in the Iberoamerican Poetry Contest “Liberty Letters” by Un Mundo Sin Mordaza. Her poems appear in several anthologies published in Venezuela, Argentina, Mexico, Spain, and Ecuador. Her most recent collection, A través del ruido / Through the noise, will be published in a bilingual edition by Scrambler Books in 2019.

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