English Original
shaking the bats
out of the mainsail
a cloud of night
made homeless
by my hands
Ribbons, 2:4, 2006
M. Kei
Chinese Translation (Traditional)
從主帆中
抖落出一群蝙蝠
像是夜空的烏雲
我親手造成
它們無家可歸
Chinese Translation (Simplified)
从主帆中
抖落出一群蝙蝠
像是夜空的乌云
我亲手造成
它们无家可归
Bio Sketch
M. Kei is a tall ship sailor and award-winning poet who lives on Maryland’s Eastern shore. He is the editor of Atlas Poetica: A Journal of World Tanka. His most recent collection of poetry is January, A Tanka Diary. He is also the author of the award-winning gay Age of Sail adventure novels, Pirates of the Narrow Seas. He can be followed on Twitter @kujakupoet, or visit AtlasPoetica.org.
This is an effective tanka. It has an unusual imaginative premise, a strong visual movement, and, most importantly, an emotional resonance that emerges without being explained.
ReplyDeleteIts L3 is the poem's pivotal line. It transforms what might otherwise be a straightforward observation of bats sheltering in a sail into something much more suggestive.
There are several things happening here:
1. A transformation of perception
The bats are individual creatures, but suddenly they become something larger and less tangible: a cloud of night. The image dissolves their separate identities into a single dark, moving presence.
2. Night becomes something physical
Normally, night is an atmospheric condition, not an object that can be displaced. But the bats embody night so completely that when they are disturbed, it seems as though night itself is being shaken loose.
This is an imaginative leap, and it gives the poem its magic.
3. A suggestion of the natural world's vulnerability
The phrase also makes the bats seem like a fragment of darkness that has found shelter in the sail. The human action of shaking them out becomes an act of dislocation, even though it may be entirely innocent or necessary.
In the case of this tanka, its Ls 4&5 , "made homeless / by my hands," are particularly effective because it introduces an ethical dimension.
The speaker becomes conscious of having displaced other living beings. There is perhaps a small pang of guilt, but the poem doesn't insist on it.
The word "homeless" is especially interesting. It gives the bats a human condition without making them conventionally anthropomorphic. It also carries associations of refuge, belonging, and the loss of shelter.
And L5, "by my hands," brings the responsibility back to the speaker. The hands are both practical instruments and agents of disturbance.