I have come to the conviction that if you cannot translate your thoughts into uneducated language, then your thoughts were confused. Power to translate is the test of having really understood one's own meaning. A passage from some theological work for translation into the vernacular ought to be a compulsory paper in every ordination examination.
C.S. Lewis in The Grand Miracle
Submitted by Rebeca Bucur
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Many Can Teach Few Can Write
many can teach and be good teachers
some even aspiring excellent teachers
but few can image write wondrous words
who are now waiting among
those who have words worth writing
words waiting to be written?
writing will cost much
demanded much
then will cost yet more
a small fortune in wages
wages spent not made
still to be spent and yet
accumulative cost is nothing
for there are hunger hearts
minds waiting for these words
looking even searching
for quest sought words
therefore it matters not
if for a specific poem
or passage paragraph
only a few or one is searching
these thoughts
are important
still must be written
some of what we write
even much of what we write
is of no prime importance
but that small portion
which is important
that tiny potent seed
which is important
must be written
translate many can translate
some even translate
almost perfectly precise
but those writing
original thoughts
are far more precious
and their words
will also in their time
be sought after read
but there time is not yet
that which is not
written cannot
be read
therefore write
write
and write well
poem by Terence George Craddock
Submitted by Poetry Lover
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Clay Upon The Wheel
The poet, like the potter,
takes the raw clay of thoughts
and shapes them
through the mind of his loving you.
The beauty of these fragments
without having to expend the energy
to try to express
the image envisioned.
Through the medium
of paper or clay
for personal solitaire,
or the benevolence of other eyes.
Each colour and weave
their thoughts in different patterns
seeing different visions
momentarily lost in their multiple meanings.
At the outset is vision
our struggles to seize or translate it
sully the brightness
in giving it flesh, the vision is muddied, lost.
poem by Terence George Craddock
Submitted by Poetry Lover
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Who's To Blame
Oh Mother Ghana; Mother Ghana
What has happened to you?
What has happened to your culture?
They say we've fold arms against 'Vernacular' language
Instead opened arms wide to 'English' language
Oh Mother Ghana Mother Ghana
Why?
At school, we are taught the things we do not know
By the 'English' language
Why not 'Vernacular' language?
Oh Mother Ghana, Oh Mother Ghana
Where is your true identity as pure African?
Where is your pride as true Ghanaian?
Oh Mother Ghana, Oh Mother Ghana,
Day after day
When we put on the uniform as students
We are forbidden to speak 'Vernacular' language
Instead the 'English' language
Why Mother Ghana, why Mother Ghana?
When we speak 'Vernacular' language; your culture,
They say: 'Speak English' someone's culture!
When we speak 'English' that someone's culture
They say: 'Abrofosem; speak vernacular language' your culture!
Oh Mother Ghana, Oh Mother Ghana
Who's to blame?
'English or Vernacular language'
Oh Mother Ghana; Oh Mother Ghana.
poem by Francis Julian Zewu
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A Poet's Rue
I remember as a young boy
Sitting on top Mount Parnassus
Consumed in writing I enjoyed.
Mostly poetry to express
At the time my innermost thoughts
While below my childhood playmates
Romped and played and most often fought.
And myself trying to translate
Feelings into coherent thought
And writing them down on paper.
I recollect those times that taught
Self- discipline behavior.
Yet if I lived it all again
I would be one of those children.
poem by Albert Ahearn
Submitted by Poetry Lover
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As far as modern writing is concerned, it is rarely rewarding to translate it, although it might be easy. Translation is very much like copying paintings.
quote by Boris Pasternak
Submitted by Lucian Velea
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Poets Lost In Translation
several differing translations
of some masterpiece poems
written by immortal poets
timeless especially esteemed
written in foreign languages
stresses how much poetry
suffers lost in translation
it is the hardest literary
medium to translate due
to the multiple meanings
of some words choice chosen
in the original mother language
the wonderful poetic effects
linking such words achieves
resonates in receptive souls
Is a good translation only
achieved when the translator
is a poet with a mother tongue
knowledge of both languages
in use vibrating admiration?
Is an intimate knowledge
a unique empathic sensitivity
for chosen poet in translation
a prime necessity in translating
feelings emotions ideals writ?
poem by Terence George Craddock
Submitted by Poetry Lover
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Mathematicians are like Frenchmen whatever you say to them they translate into their own language and forthwith it is something entirely different.
Mathematicians are like Frenchmen: whatever you say to them they translate into their own language, and forthwith it is something entirely different.
Mathematicians are like Frenchmen whatever you say to them they translate into their own language and forthwith it is something entirely different.
A poetic thoughts
“Hi, how do the poetic thoughts emerge in mind”?
I was unable to react and reply to the question of its kind
I had to struggle hard for the answer to find
I just kept cool and struggled in mind
I pleaded her for putting good thoughts across
You must have enough of trust in cross
It is not brilliance of an individual
You get it with blessings very casual
it got to be translated into words immediately
It may have no use if done very lately
Its real impact and feelings may go away
You may not have any means to recollect or find the way
It can be great moment of joy for self and family
It has not been forced on you heavily
The family and friends definitely strengthen the line
You exceedingly perform well and feel very fine
There is no dearth of good thoughts all over
It has good backing and natural cover
To translate and add color to it is not that difficult
Such quality is inherent and inbuilt
You can nicely compose if you determine one day
You may certainly find the resolve and clear way
There is every possibility of surging ahead
You may one day excel and definitely lead
You should have natural instinct to pick up leads
Try to put in fine composition with interwoven words
It may result in fine creation of poetry
you may have then full satisfaction with remarkable entry
You can try to translate feelings into action
It must have fine combination with good reaction
It may give then good sense of satisfaction
This is poetry skill and very good indication
poem by Hasmukh Amathalal
Submitted by Poetry Lover
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Pictures
The thoughts in my head are about as certain as the weather
I always want them witty but they don’t come out…
Like that
And I gotta go back to the drawing board, sharpen my pencil
Cause I can’t buy metaphors
Like I can buy stencils
So the sand keeps falling 'til my mind is all clear
And ideas stop spinning
Like I’m drunken off of beer
Then I stare and I leer in the direction of nothing
Soon ugly comparisons look
Like that little duckling
The swan looks great but must still fly to paper
And stick...
Nah that’s too easy, I’ll think of something later
An hour has passed and I see the top half of the glass
I’ve got two good lines now
But I’ll save ‘em for last
What I need is some inspiration
That’ll get the ball rollin’
From still frames to animation
Now the feature’s goin’
*This is a peek, a sneak look around
On how I take my thoughts and process them down
From a thousand different pictures with one thing in common
This is how I translate the world that I’m in
I can hear the sound effects and see the movie playing
Cross out words like an editor
As my lead gets to slaying
Every single word that’ll make you think twice
Like an anagram racecar throwin’ snake eyes?
Now the sands reverse with the opposite effect
And I see every line
Like it’s satellite direct
That’s how my thoughts beam down
Didn’t mean to barrage ya
But these words are my own
Kind of like Natasha
poem by P.R. Prosper
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Thoughts Mind Soul Echoes
thoughts like children
scatter from our mind
thoughts were part of us?
thoughts came from us?
thoughts live beyond us?
thoughts outlive our lives?
thoughts mind soul echoes
haunting fragments of mind
light shines through prisms
separates into colour bands
thought trails sunset colours
spectrum ribbons thoughts
spiral into keen conceptions
meaning insight discriminates
poem by Terence George Craddock
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0011 Blown Rose Wise
How wise
the rose?
near the shortest day,
the seasons all confused this year
even the great globe itself
confused by man
and on this gusty day
a rose throws
itself upon the world
simultaneously hero, heroine, victim
seen calling through the window;
if it were a child alone out there
you would rush out to save it
does the rose know
how beautiful it is?
or is it wiser than we are,
knows more of love?
of law?
looks tenderly upon
man’s need for beauty,
frail reassurance
of the beauty of our own soul
any moment now
the wind will tear its weakening petals
yet I saw it while it lasted, as if
the only rose in the world
and before it returned
to wherever the souls of roses
sigh, laugh, smile,
return to eternal Rose
it wrote this poem in – to it –
an unfamiliar language
that tried to translate
its beauty into me
wiser, in some way,
than I
poem by Michael Shepherd
Submitted by Poetry Lover
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Love Consuming
Thoughts of you consume me
Hold power over me every
Second of the day
I wonder at His glory that is
a woman and ask who is
She that walks so proudly?
Thoughts of you consume me
Hold power over me every
Dream I dream
You walk through me like
A chill on winters eve. I see
You but I am but a shade
Unto you
Thoughts of you consume me
Hold power over me every
Breathe I take
You are the forest to my trees
That hide me from your sight.
We dance the dance of the
Stars and thoughts of you
Consume me
Thoughts of you consume me
Hold power over me every
Death I die
Her being, her beauty burns
Through me. I died in her
Passing when she smiled unto
Me
Thoughts of you consume me
Hold power over me every
Kiss you kiss me...
poem by Leonid Gonzalez
Submitted by Poetry Lover
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Linguist
If we lived in a world where bells
truly say "ding-dong" and where "moo"
is a rather neat thing
said by a cow,
I could believe you could believe
that these sounds I make in the air
and these shapes with which I blacken white paper
have some reference
to the thoughts in my mind
and the feelings in the thoughts.
As things are,
if I were to gaze in your eyes and say
"bow-wow" or "quack", you must take that to be
a despairing anthology of praises,
a concentration of all the opposites
of reticence, a capsule
of my meaning of meaning
that I can no more write down
than I could spell the sound of the sigh
I would then utter, before
dingdonging and mooing my way
through all the lexicons and languages
of imprecision.
poem by Norman MacCaig
Submitted by Dan Costinaş
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Neither can embellishments of language be found without arrangement and expression of thoughts, nor can thoughts be made to shine without the light of language.
Ink (for Theresa Marie)
As I crease each page with the pressure of my point,
Cutting into the flow of each character,
I strive to lay lines to the surface of meaning.
I attempt to make sense of the flow of my thoughts
As I try to define with each separate line
The value that each gesture strives for.
I cut into pieces the correlation
Among the characters in my narrative;
Between scribing and feeling.
But this contradiction between purpose and process,
Between intention and muscle response,
Belies the nature of liquid.
For the amount of flow,
If nature has its way,
Is determined by the size of its reservoir.
So to finish my thoughts
In the context of language
Do I cede to the size of my pen?
Do I rely on the nature of language?
Or the language of nature’s mien?
poem by Dan Ramirez
Submitted by Poetry Lover
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Do You Have Any Thoughts About Me?
Do you have any thoughts about me?
And I want to know if the thoughts that you have about me
Are any good?
Do you mind sharing the thoughts about me?
What are the thoughts about me like?
Are the thoughts about me semtimental?
Are the thoughts about me very romantic?
Are the thoughts about me full of love?
poem by Aldo Kraas
Submitted by Poetry Lover
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I don't know the rules of grammar... If you're trying to persuade people to do something, or buy something, it seems to me you should use their language, the language they use every day, the language in which they think. We try to write in the vernacular.
quote by David Ogilvy
Submitted by Lucian Velea
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I Write In Lead Part 2
You see I write in lead
cause having poetry impact my life
Everyday is empowering
Can't complete a thought 'cause
Before I can access feelings stored inside
My mind is weaving another strand of meaning and context
'Cause Poetry's deciphered my semantic properties
Unraveling down to the morphological units
Unlacing more of me
And that I don't need a pen
To bleed thoughts of truth
Let me know cause I don't understand
Can't put into concrete thoughts
My grasp of linguistics no longer suffice
To decode the relationship between
Mind and hand
pen and poet
Carefully marking down gibberish
Only understood by the two
I guess that's how it works
Some things have no outside reason to stand
But the only one that comes from within
An I write in lead cause
I can't get out the right pattern of words
I keep erasing
Always in search of a better way
To state how it is that I
am processing poetry
I don't want to use pen
cause fact of the matter is poetry
Shakes the profound core
My factory of thoughts
Engraved permanently in paper
Leaves no space to illustrate
How poetry pushes me to the edge of language
And then I realize
The edge is more like an extending bridge of vocabulary
I can continue building letters
Making meaning
There's no saying
Where interpretation will stop
That is what
poetry is
Making my hand ache
but the thought of not scribing
Leaves less space
For our bridge to extend
Connect To find a better way
to spill my insides out
Poetry's my speech therapy
Cause the more I interpret poetry's word
the more I record how its being comes forth
tough and registers in a soft key
Through syllables
The more clearly I see
through the lens I read
The world and my synthesis
is me
I want to take all of poetry in
So it lives endlessly in meaning
If the path of our voices crosses only momentarily
I'd like for poetry to still live through my expression
Aiding the love affair of
Mind hand and heart
poem by Samantha Campbell
Submitted by Poetry Lover
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