Eternal Traffic

Mila Haugova, James Sutherland-Smith, Viera Sutherland-Smith, James Sutherland-Smith, Viera Sutherland-Smith

• Publisher: Arc Publications
• Year: 2020
• Print ISBN: 9781911469612
• eBook ISBN: 9781911469629
• Topic: Literature
• Subtopic: European Poetry
• Index: Literature

Mila Haugova has written a moving book about the farewell of loved ones and the slipping away of one's own life. The starting point is a double loss: her mother dies and her lover goes his own way. During her dead mother's childhood and distant past, the loved ones have faced a hoped-for future. Now only a reduced daily life remains, shot through with ever present memories. Haugova overlays the departed, and now recalculated, images of childhood and days spent with her lover. Is it possible to find some memory of lost warmth in this cold world?

Re-encounter and farewells are one in Haugova's poetry: there are intimate companions in the absence of loved ones, in the acceptance of their disappearance, which over time develop a cathartic force that makes possible new love.

THE DISAPPEARANCE OF ANGELS
MIZNUTIE ANJELOV

* * *

Akoby

ilúzia a mlčanie a náhoda stali sa Telom si tá ktorá sa pozerá späť

Akoby nekonečná kamera filmovala nekonečný Priestor

a tam kde nekončíme

by vznikala tvár bezo mňa v hlbokej (hnedožltej) tráve

Odpočúvanej zimy

10.12. 2007

* * *

As if

illusion and silence and chance became Body you are the one who looks back

As if an infinite camera filmed an infinite Space

and there where we don’t finish

a face without me would come into being in the deep (brown-yellow) grass

of a Winter overheard

10.12.2007

BEZ

Miznutie: zimný anjel

v trúfalých možnostiach

vlastného neba: pomalý dar

pozornosť vznešené plynutie

toho najobyčajnejšieho dňa

Srdce ide proti mne

Vina a odpustenie sa nás Nedotkli

Zmilovanie nás presahuje

Ústa snehu nečakane

Otvárajú novú krajinu

30.12.2007 predposledný večer

roka mama bez teba

WITHOUT

disappearance: the winter angel

in the daring possibilities

of its own heaven: a slow gift

of attention sublime consequence

of this most ordinary day

My heart goes against me

Guilt and forgiveness have not touched us

Mercy surpasses us

A mouth of snow unexpectedly

Opens a new landscape

30.12.2007 the last but one evening

of the year mama without you

* * *

Vziať reč. Mlčanie. Polosvit roztvorenej oblohy: Pytagoras

(za zástenou): príkaz je

vytrvať a čakať na hrane: na ostrej hrane zdanlivo poddajnej

hmly nevidím ale sa to deje:

postupnosť tieňov padá na blízky pahorok: studený hlas

Kam ideš?

* * *

To take hold of speech. Silence. Halflight of an unfolding sky: Pythagoras

(behind a screen): the command is

to endure and wait at the edge: I can’t see at the sharp edge of the seemingly

yielding fog but it’s happening:

the sequence of shadows falls on a nearby hillside: a cold voice

Where are you going?

LEVITÁCIA

Vidím to okolo: sekundy Predĺžený raster

Čas akoby postavený proti rýchlosti svetla: nočné zábery

prázdne letiská autá vlaky

Lucidné priestory večnej premávky

dityramb

Tvár spiaceho čínskeho dieťaťa ako v sebe mlčky

uzavretá planéta putujúca

a vzďaľujúca sa vo Vesmíre –

LEVITATION

I see it round: seconds an Extended grid

Time as if set against the speed of light: night shots

an empty airport cars trains

Lucid spaces of eternal traffic

dithyramb

The face of a sleeping Chinese child silent in itself

a closed planet journeying

and lingering in the Universe –

NEHA DIALKY JE NEPRIESTRELNÁ

(Narodí sa malá biela nosorožka v zoologickej záhrade)

Prvá krajina: Vodopád naladený ladičkou (prúd sna)

Druhá krajina: Ženy v slnečnom daždi (naveky dievčatká)

Tretia krajina: Voliéra s hyacintovým papagájom (náhrada raja)

Štvrtá krajina: Kto sme my dve (kto si nás sem spolu zavolal?)

(Dcére Elvíre ZOO Viedeň máj 2008)

THE TENDERNESS OF DISTANCE IS BULLETPROOF

(A small white rhinoceros is born in the zoo)

First landscape: A waterfall tuned by a pitch pipe (dream current)

Second country: Women in sunlit rain (girls eternally)

Third country: An aviary with a hyac...

Table of contents

• COVER
• TITLE PAGE
• COPYRIGHT
• CONTENTS
• INTRODUCTION
• from WHITE MANUSCRIPTS Biele rukopisy
• THE DISAPPEARANCE OF ANGELS Miznutie anjelov
• BIOGRAPHICAL NOTES