dual naps,
my daughter and I,
me, old and sick,
she, young
and full of life
M. Kei
Chinese Translation (Traditional)
兩人午睡，
我和女兒，
我年老多病，
她，年輕
和充滿生機
Chinese Translation (Simplified)
两人午睡，
我和女儿，
我年老多病，
她，年轻
和充满生机
Bio Sketch
M. Kei is a tall ship sailor and award-winning poet. He is the editor-in-chief of Take Five : Best Contemporary Tanka, and the author of Slow Motion : The Log of a Chesapeake Bay Skipjack (Recommend Reading by the Chesapeake Bay Project). He is the editor of Atlas Poetica : A Journal of Poetry of Place in Contemporary Tanka and compiler of the Bibliography of English-Language Tanka. He has published over 1500 tanka poems. He also published a gay Asian-themed fantasy novel, Fire Dragon. Twitter: @kujakupoet
Cinematically/visually speaking, this relationship tanka depicts an establishing shot that sets the context, thematic and emotive, for a scene (dual naps). What's left unsaid is more important than what's stated. On a second reading, Ls 2&5 invest L1 with a symbolic meaning. (Generally speaking, the young and energetic daughter doesn't need to take a nap).
ReplyDeleteM's one-shot tanka reminds me of the opening scene of Atom Egoyan's 1997 'The Sweet Hereafter:' 'a scene of tranquility, as a family of three--mother, father, child--sleeps on a bare wooden floor.'