HILARY ELFICK

‘The past is another country’

 

It’s something about Surrey. That moment, then,
felt free. Only now when I remember, down

here that first time in the bush, stilled into waking
by a herald not heard before, impossible to imagine

as I lay surprised by light, the currawong
clearing his throat, beginning to sing

so I rolled out of ant-columned sheets, checking shirt and shoe
for poisonous spider, watching through fly-screen the slow

shuffle of a home-bound wombat snuffling through lace
of sunlit web, claws groping into maze

of burrows, blindly seeking for his mate’s
own homely scent, and I bereft wondering what right

I had to be here, watching, and what shift
of timing and of grace had brought me, what drift

of blind, persistent hunger’d made me come
to this place at this time, like thistledown

to echidna, antechinus, currawong whose fate
had nothing to do with where I was or how, in this odd light

a half-world over. That topsy-turvy choice had felt quite free
but nothing ever is. And who can tell, and sure as hell not me,

what made me come here, that time, then, to find
this flip-side of myself, my stranger mind.

Roxana-Monica Mîndrican

Hilary Elfick
 

Trecutul este un alt tărâm

E o poveste despre Surrey. In clipa aceea
m-am simtit libera. Amintindu-mi acum

de popasul din padurice, oprita de o voce divina,*
ce straina mi-era si nu o pot evoca,

stateam buimaca in lumina,in timp ce un currawong*
dregandu-si vocea incepu sa cante

m-am ridicat din culcusul cu musuroaie de furnici
cautand paianjeni otravitori in camasa si pantofi,

urmarind sovaiala unui wombat* ce mormaia
in lumina dantelata, bajbaind cu ghiarele

dupa vizuina, adulmecand mirosul familiar
al perechii sale, si frustrata ma intrebam

cu ce drept eram aici si priveam,
ce intamplare divina ma adusese aici,

ce dorinta oarba si arzatoare ma purtase
aici si acum ca pe un puf de papadie

alaturi de echidna, antechin,* currawong care nu puteau
sti cand si cum ajunsesem aici, in lumina bizara

a unei lumi aproape uitate. Acea alegere anapoda*
a parut deliberata, dar nimic nu este. Si cine poate sti,

caci eu nu am habar, ce m-a adus acolo, atunci, sa-mi descopar
aceasta latura ciudata,* aceasta constiinta ce imi e straina.*

*I translated “by a herald” by “de o voce divina”(by a divine voice) because the adjective “divine” can be assocoated with the noun “herald” (which could be also ranslated as “prophet”). Therefore I interpreted “herald” as divine voice (that of a prophet, or an angel).

*Currawongs are medium-sized passerine birds of the family Artamidae native to Australasia. There are either three or four species (depending on whether the Australian Magpie is counted as a currawong or not). The common name comes from the call of the familiar Pied Currawong of eastern Australia and is onomatopoeic. An older name was Crow-shrike, though this is not used currently.

*Wombats are Australian marsupials; they are short-legged, muscular quadrupeds, approximately 1 metre (39 in) in length with a very short tail. They are found in forested, mountainous, and heathland areas of south-eastern Australia and Tasmania. The name wombat comes from the Eora Aboriginal community who were the original inhabitants of the Sydney area.
 

*echidna= Any of several nocturnal, burrowing, egg-laying mammals of the genera Tachyglossus and Zaglossus of Australia, Tasmania, and New Guinea, having a spiny coat, slender snout, and an extensible sticky tongue used for catching insects. Also called spiny anteater.

*Antechinus is a genus of dasyurid marsupial that is indigenous to Australia (including Tasmania and some outlying islands) and New Guinea. The majority of Antechinus species occur in Australia and only two species (currently with a putative third) have been described in New Guinea. Members of this species have been called broad-footed marsupial mice, pouched mice, or antechinus shrews.

*„topsy-turvy” = in a state of complete disorder and confusion. „topsy-turvy choice” could be therefore interpreted as a choice made in a state of confusion, as a wrong, awry choice- „alegere anapoda”( „anapoda” means „wrong”,”awry”)

*„flip-side”= the bad effect of something that also has good effects; I chose „latura ciudata” for „flips-side of myself”, because „ciudata” (strange) is word with both positive and negative connotations; something „strange” is not necessarily something „bad”, or „negative, but it could be.

*„stranger mind” could refer to the part of consciousness that we are not fully aware of- therefore „constiinta ce imi straina”(a cosciousness which is strange to me) expresses this idea.