Poems by Tone Hødnebø
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from UTILITY AND DEEDS DONE (2016) NYTTE OG UTFØRTE GJERNINGER 1. Betroelser får meg til å betro meg, det dumme blir gjentatt fordi det blir skrevet i bøker. Det går ikke an å bytte et liv, jeg er ikke Medea, og jeg er heller ikke den ene ternen som ble spart. Det er bedre å puste inn andre menneskers pust. When you confide I confide, the foolishness repeats itself as it is written in books. It is not feasible to switch lives, I am not Medea, nor am I the only maiden spared. It is preferable to breathe other peoples breath. 2. Vinden øker, fordampningen fra huden minsker, alle kjærtegn blir slettet, og det vi holder mest kjært. Mens jeg gikk rundt meg selv forsvant det jeg ville løse opp, ikke ifølge en matematisk formel: Men hvordan skal vi tilgi de som elsker oss. The wind intensifies, the evaporation from the skin lessens, every touch is eliminated, and that which is most dear to us. While I was walking in circles what I wanted to solve vanished, not according to a mathematical equation: But how do we forgive the ones that love us. 3. Å kjenne et menneske hele livet kan være en målestokk for verden, og jeg vet ikke engang hva du drømmer. Det besværlige må knytes opp for å snu verden inn mot verden. Jeg leter etter en setning mens blomstene gror og visner igjen i takt med årstidene akkurat som et broderi. Bladene folder seg ut, klorofyllet spres, treet blir grønnere. Biene surrer og surrer i hagen. To know a person all your life can be a method of measuring the world, and I don’t even know what you are dreaming. What´s complicated needs to be untangled to turn the world towards the world. I am searching for a sentence while the flowers grow and wither according to the seasons just like an embroidery. The leaves unfold, chlorophyll scattered, the tree becomes greener. The bees buzzing and buzzing in the garden. 4. Betroelser får meg til å betro meg, det dumme blir gjentatt fordi det blir skrevet i bøker. Det går ikke an å bytte et liv, jeg er ikke Medea, og jeg er heller ikke den ene ternen som ble spart. Det er bedre å puste inn andre menneskers pust. When you confide I confide, the foolishness repeats itself as it is written in books. It is not feasible to switch lives, I am not Medea, nor am I the only maiden spared. It is preferable to breathe other peoples breath. 5. Du står stille som en soldat til noen begynner å spa opp jord og du må bevege føttene, danse som en bokser. Jeg teller til tre, fire, fem, til hundre. Man trenger bare tre ting: hånd, øyne, hjerte for å lure seg selv til alle døgnets tider. You stand motionless like a soldier until someone begins digging compelled to move your feet, you dance like a boxer. I am counting to three, four, five, to a hundred. One needs no more than three things: hand, eyes, heart to fool oneself at all hours. 6. TRÅD Penelope vevde et fint tøy, for hver tråd hun spant telte hun timer og dager og for hver dag en ny dåd. Krigen kunne ikke vente, men hun ventet på at krigen skulle ende, og tvinnet garnet til hendene ble blodige. Jeg ville bli glad hvis du kunne besøke meg i drømmene, skrev hun, og løste opp om natten det hun vevde om dagen /for å holde frierne unna/ samtidig ble tolv terner hengt. Dagen ble kortere, og natten lengre, før hun ble vekket av Evrykleia. THREAD Penelope wove a fine cloth, for every thread she spun she counted hours and days and for each day a new deed. The war couldn’t wait, however she waited for the war to end, and spun the yarn until her hands became bloody. I would be glad if you could visit me in my dreams, she wrote and took apart at night what she had woven during the day /to keep the suiters at bay/ at the same time twelve maidens hanged. The days became shorter and the nights longer, before Evrycleia woke her up. 7. MATTEUS 7: 3-5 Jeg satt høyt oppe i et tre mens hjertet hamret og hamret registrerte jeg at kroppen var speilvendt, og bjelken i mitt øye var som splinten i ditt. I boken står det at øynene er sjelens speil og at det fins en felles verden for oss, men jeg skjulte en verden for deg, min verden vel og merke, din verden har jeg ikke sett snurten av bare så vidt du vet det. MATTHEW 7: 3–5 I sat in a tree my heart was pounding and pounding I became aware that my body was mirrored and the beam in my eyes was like the splinter in yours. The book says the eyes are mirrors of the soul and that there is a world to share, but I conceiled a world from you, my world to be clear, your world remains unrevealed just as long as you know. All poems translated into english by Cecilie Dahl |
Tone Hødnebø was born in Oslo in 1962, and spent her childhood in Tønsberg. She later studied at the University in Oslo, and in Trondheim. In the 90ties she was a co-editor of the literary magazine Vagant. She is now living in Oslo. Hødnebø´s volumes of poetry include Larm (Noise, 1989), Mørkt kvadrat (Dark Square, 1994), Pendel (Pendulum, 1997), Stormstigen (Stormladder, 2002), og Nedtegnelser (Jottings, 2008). She has also published a small work on poetics, Skamfulle Pompeii (Bashful Pompeii, 2004, H Press), as well as a translation of Emily Dickinson´s poetry Skitne lille hjerte (This Dirty Little Heart, 1995). A selection of poetry, Et lykkelig øyeblikk (A Happy Moment) was published in 2005, and complete poems Å snu verden in mot verden (To turn the world into the world) in 2019. She has translated Anne Carson´s Glass, Irony and God, and Autobiography of red into Norwegian. Her latest book of poetry Utility and deeds done came out in 2016. The slow pace with which she publishes her books – it has never been less than three years between them, and usually five – testifies to the deep consideration in her work progress. The will to blend the rationality of engineering, the tectonics of architecture, and the emotionality of the poet is insistent. This paradoxical relation between the immeasurable complexity of thought and the measurability of the world governs Hødnebø´s poetry and pulls it in many directions.
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