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Marc Tritsmans: In America

By Marc Tritsmans, translated by Paul Vincent
23 March 2022 3 min. reading time Friday Verses

This week’s Friday Verses are written by Marc Tritsmans. We translated In Amerika. This poem first appeared in Dutch in Het Liegend Konijn, a magazine for contemporary Dutch-language poetry.

Marc Tritsmans (Antwerp, b. 1959) has published numerous collections of poetry, including Studie van de schaduw (Study of the Shadow, 2010), which was awarded the Herman de Coninck Prize, Aanrakingen (Contacts, 2015) and Het zingen van de wereld (The Singing of the World, 2017). The latter collection was translated into Afrikaans and was published in South Africa in 2019 as Die singende wêreld. In 2020 his thirteenth collection, Alles is hier nog (All Is Still Here), appeared.

In America

1.

Once I went to America
but actually I never did
quite arrive in America, for as
we made that very first turn

over the coasts of Zeeland, with the Western
and the Eastern Scheldt there far below us
glistening in the sun, all that familiar
sand and water, half my soul

got caught on the Haamstede lighthouse.
So that with no more than half a soul I arrived
on the other side in the mighty hum

of the city that really never sleeps and in which
all too many buildings reaching obtrusively
for the sky just made me lower my eyes.

2.

Even my feet faltered, stumbled because
they felt only the chill hardness of concrete
and stone while across the wide river
the forest. It breathed mist and drew me

towards it. Promised a place of safekeeping
where I suspected silence and the rich smell
of forest soil and toadstools. But we could
not come together since here too

the water was far too deep. Why did I not
understand and know at once that on that other
bank the missing, slower half of my soul

had meanwhile washed up naturally and
and now walked without this restless body but
on bare feet over the cool skin of earth?

(Dutch translation below the photo)

In Amerika

1.

Ooit ben ik naar Amerika geweest
maar eigenlijk ben ik nooit helemaal
in Amerika aangekomen want terwijl
we nog maar die eerste bocht maakten

over de kusten van Zeeland, met de Wester-
en de Oosterschelde daar diep onder ons
glinsterend in de zon, al dat vertrouwde
zand en water, bleef de helft van mijn ziel

al haperen aan de vuurtoren van Haamstede.
Met niet meer dan een halve ziel dus aan de
overzijde aanbeland in het machtige gedruis

van de stad die inderdaad nooit slaapt en waarin
al te veel opdringerig naar de hemel reikende
gebouwen mij de ogen slechts deden neerslaan.

2.

Zelfs mijn voeten haperden, struikelden omdat
ze enkel de kille hardheid van beton en klinkers
voelden terwijl aan de overkant van de brede
rivier het bos. Het ademde nevel en trok me

naar zich toe. Beloofde een plek van bewaring
waar ik stilte en de zware geur van bosgrond
en paddenstoelen vermoedde. Maar we konden
bij elkander niet komen want ook hier was

het water veel te diep. Waarom begreep en
wist ik niet meteen dat op die andere oever
de ontbrekende, tragere helft van mijn ziel

ondertussen als vanzelf was aangespoeld en
daar nu zonder dit rusteloze lichaam maar wel
op blote voeten over de koele huid van aarde liep?

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