[Son os remendos quen nos restitúen]

by Berta Dávila

Son os remendos quen nos restitúen,

as cicatrices as que fan fogar.

Entre todos os vértices desta casa

escollo o único imperfecto,

o devir do zurcido polas liñas do día,

a poética muda do calcetín azul

rachado sempre polo calcañar.

espido

[It’s the mending that restores us]

by Berta Dávila

It’s the mending that restores us,

home is made of scars.

Here in this house of angles

I’ve chosen one imperfect thing,

the slow becoming of the darn,

the silent poetry of one blue sock

always holey in the heel.

naked

translated from Galician by Neil D. Anderson

more>>

Berta Dávila lives in Santiago de Compostela, Galicia (Spain). Dávila is the author of the poetry collections Corpo baleiro (2007), Dentro (2008), Raíz da fenda (2013), as well as the narrative works Bailarei sobre a túa tumba (2008) and O derradeiro libro de Emma Olsen (2013).

Neil D. Anderson is a visiting assistant professor of Spanish at Texas Tech University. His translations of Galician poetry and short fiction have appeared in journals such as Shearsman, Asymptote, The Bitter Oleander, Drunken Boat, and Absinthe.

Circumference

Poetry in Translation

[Son os remendos quen nos restitúen]

[It’s the mending that restores us]