"Find work"
by RHYNA P. ESPAILLAT
My mother's mother, widowed very young
of her first love, and of that love's first fruit,
of her first love, and of that love's first fruit,
moved through her father's farm, her country tongue
and country heart anaesthetized and mute
with labor. So her kind was taught to do -
"Find work", she would reply to every grief -
and her one dictum, whether false or ture,
tolled heavy with her passionate belief.
Widowed again, with children, in her prime,
she spoke so little it was hard to bear
so much composure, such a truce with time
spent in the lifelong practice of despair.
But I recall her floors, scrubbed white as bone,
her dishes, and how painfully they shone.
and country heart anaesthetized and mute
with labor. So her kind was taught to do -
"Find work", she would reply to every grief -
and her one dictum, whether false or ture,
tolled heavy with her passionate belief.
Widowed again, with children, in her prime,
she spoke so little it was hard to bear
so much composure, such a truce with time
spent in the lifelong practice of despair.
But I recall her floors, scrubbed white as bone,
her dishes, and how painfully they shone.
Source: Poetry (February 1999)
La madre di mia madre, vedova molto presto
del suo primo amore, e del primo frutto di quell'amore,
viveva nella fattoria di suo padre, la sua lingua
ed il suo cuore di campagna muti e anestetizzati
dalla fatica. Così le era stato insegnato -
"Trova lavoro", rispondeva ad ogni cruccio -
e la sua affermazione, vera o falsa che fosse,
esigeva dazio al suo credo appassionato.
Vedova di nuovo, con bambini, nella sua maturità,
parlava così poco che era molto difficile sopportare
così tanta compostezza, una tale tregua col tempo
speso nella pratica giornaliera della disperazione.
Ma io ricordo le sue piastrelle, tirate a lucido come ossa,
i suoi piatti, e quanto essi brillassero con pena.
Traduzione di Ipazia
