as a child
I thought I'd never grow up
now it seems
I've wandered forever
in this redwood forest
The Tanka Journal, 39, 2011
Peggy Heinrich
Chinese Translation (Traditional)
我在小的時候
心想永遠都不會長大
現在看來
我已經永遠徘徊
在這紅木森林中
Chinese Translation (Simplified)
我在小的时候
心想永远都不会长大
现在看来
我已经永远徘徊
在这红木森林中
Bio Sketch
Peggy Heinrich's seven books of poetry include most recently, Forward Moving Shadows, a collection of tanka with photographs by John Bolivar. The same pair published, via Modern English Tanka Press, Peeling an Orange, with Heinrich's haiku and Bolivar's photos. A native New Yorker, Peggy resettled in Santa Cruz, California, after many cold winters in New York and Connecticut.
The upper verse successfully sets the thematic context while the lower one works effectively on at least two levels, literal and metaphoric. The redwood forest, one of the important thematic motifs in children's literature, functions like Neverland featured in the works of J. M. Barrie and those based on them.
ReplyDeleteHere are two books about the redwood forest:
Dror Shai Levi's The Sacred Redwood Forest
and Jason Chin's Redwoods, whose summary is as follows:
"An ordinary train ride becomes and extraordinary trip to the great ancient forests
A subway trip is transformed when a young boy happens upon a book about redwood forests. As he reads the information unfolds, and with each new bit of knowledge, he travels--all the way to California to climb into the Redwood canopy. Crammed with interesting and accurate information about these great natural wonders, Jason Chin's first book is innovative nonfiction set within a strong and beautiful picture storybook."