Broken treaties

Unciya and Hakate organize every year a native American scouting camp in Belgium. This year's theme is the trail of broken treaties. Besides using Peter La Farge's texts and Cash songs they were looking for some relevant poetry. I share here: Sherman Alexie

Broken treaties

Gambling has always been
about trust and the loss
of trust. It's never been
about money. Gambling is
nothing new for the Indians.
Gambling is traditional
and began when Columbus arrived
in our country. Indians started
to roll the dice every time
we signed another treaty
but we've always been the losers
because the dice were loaded
and the treaties broken
by random design. Now
we've got our own game
of Reservation Roulette
and I'd advise the faithful
to always bet on red.

Verbroken verdragen

Gokken ging altijd
om vertrouwen en 't verlies
van vertrouwen. Het ging nooit
om geld. Gokken is
niet nieuws voor indianen.
Gokken is traditie.
Het begon toen Columbus aankwam
in ons land. Indianen begonnen
te dobbelen elke keer
we weer een verdrag tekenden
maar we waren altijd de verliezers
want de dobbelstenen werden verzwaard
en de verdragen verbroken
lukraak en met opzet. Nu
hebben we ons eigen spel
de Reservaat Roulette
en ik geef de getrouwen de raad
zet altijd op rood.

poetic license

Before this blog, I have maintained Muddy roads & dusty trails and Tony Mafia, the painter. It's time for something new and different: Miscellaneous poetics & poetic license in as many languages as I can manage, short essays about translation of poetry, reports about events & presentations. Also places, beauty, thoughts, reading notes, poems, pictures, people's portraits, writers in prison, criticism, presentations of interesting projects e. a. Let's go, let's write, let's read. By the way a good dribble, a nice pass, power and flying with a ball on a foot has its own poetic beauty.

Liu Xiaobo (2009) writes … A Little Mouse in Prison, a poem by Liu Xiaobo, a writer in prison, whose chair is empty at the meetings of Pen Flanders.

A little mouse crawled through the iron bars
And paced nervously on my windowsill.
The worn walls watched him
The mosquitoes full of blood watched him.
He drew even heaven’s silver light
And seemed to fly.
This kind of beauty is rare.

Tonight, the mouse is a dapper gentleman.
Not eating.
Nor drinking.
Nor aimlessly chattering.
His wide-eyed stare is that of a traitor as
He walks in the moonlight.

Een kleine muis in de gevangenis
Liu Xiaobo
Een kleine muis kroop tussen de ijzeren tralies
liep nerveus heen en weer op mijn vensterbank.
De versleten muren bekeken hem
De muggen vol bloed bekeken hem.
Hij lokte zelfs het hemels zilveren licht
en leek in vlucht.
Dit soort schoonheid zie je zelden.

Vanavond is de muis een parmantige heer
Eet niet.
Drinkt niet.
Kletst niet nodeloos.
Zijn verbaasd staren is dat van een verrader zoals
Hij loopt in het ondermaanse licht.