translating- Marianna Heide

friday is always the day of translation. today i am translating geide and running into the usual problems that one finds in a poet that uses a multi layered language. when met with this predicament the translator (i.e. me) must make up his own multi layered meanings. sometimes this works sometimes it doesn't. we will see... but my brain is racked... also, i have noticed that there is a strong narrative quality to much of geide's work (as well as the work of many other young russian poets). this poses a problem because almost all of contemporary american poetry worth reading is very lyrical and oftentimes philosophically opposed to the narrative style. one of the main reasons this opposition exists is due to the idea that poetry is supposed to be first and foremost about truth; and it is thought that the lyric is more truthful than the narrative. i, of course, disagree with this veiw on many grounds, and what i have seen coming from the russia is example of what i mean... anyway still trying to figure out the schema to place on top of this mess... this wonderful pilous mess...