In units of despair: Seconds. Minutes. Hours. Days. Weeks. Months. Years. Lives.
(Poem no. 15 out of 54, located pg. 42 of ‘Messer’, 2010 print.)
Disclaimer: Poem copyrighted to Till Lindemann. This post
does not include photos/illustrations of said poem from ‘Messer’. The
original German text is also not included. This is only a interpretive
translation and accuracy is not guaranteed.
I Know
not why I get up late
Why I go to bed so early
All at my own bidding
I am lonely with much hard work
So I have lived too many years
Yet I am still too young for the stretcher
I am a half-fermented wine
A heavy desk upon one leg
No fish, and without a water-country
I’m willing to hold a young hand
But young blood respects me no more.
I have no bullet in the gun
Must I, with aging flesh, be content
Deceive my own wife by myself?
Age sleeps upon my temples
I buy my luck by the harbour
Those without beauty must at least live well
And I was never given beauty, after all.
Original Meter: All iambic tetrameters save for lines 3-4 and the final two lines, which are trochaic tetrameter.
Original Rhyme Scheme: AABB.
Comments:
This was one of the earliest efforts I made in the first incarnation of
the translation project. Had the first appearance of italicized lines
too, from what I can remember. They're all gone now; this translation is
much more accurate, I say that with confidence.
I still,
however, stand by my recommendation of Milan Kundera's 'The Unbearable
Lightness of Being' in regard to this poem. Aging and maturation are the
only ways some of the protagonists in that book solve anything at all.
Hi! I happened on your blog while I was looking for some Messer tranlation. I love R+ with all my heart and I think Till's poems are just heartbreaking and hard like a Messer in your guts!
ReplyDeleteI'm doing the same thing (translating Messer) but in Italian, and wow, it's pretty hard.
So I just wanted to say hi and that I respect you very much for all the work you've done!
Martina.
all these poems about till feeling so ugly,,,jesus does he have a mirror at home? i find him very charming but i think he felt rejected very often cuz hes a raw and intimidating character probably so other young women might view him as ugly/scary
ReplyDeleteI know, right? Jesus, he was a hunk of a man in the early R+ years and now that he's in his 50-ies, I still look at him and think.. "Wow! I want this man to be my husband and father of my children!"
DeleteAs per the other comments: I have read that his father called him ugly, among other things, for a long time. This emotional abuse is a control tactic and unfortunately stays within the mind of the abused. He is beautiful but couldn't or can't see that.
ReplyDelete