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Fjordscene Poetry

Poetry, writing and translations by K-M Skalkenæs

  • English poetry
    • 30 after thoughts (2021)
    • divisive / dismissive / missive (2018)
    • Light Requires Darkness (2018)
    • Seen From a Distance People Lose Their Eyes (2017)
    • Confessions of the Cold Light of Dawn (2014)
    • What Bits of Peace My Life’s Ensured (2014)
    • Poems Inspired by Paintings (2014)
  • Danish poetry
    • De spor man efterlader sig (2017)
  • Translations
    • Edith Södergran
      • Poems
      • The September Lyre
      • The Rose Altar
      • The Shadow of the Future
      • The Land Which Is Not
    • Gustaf Munch-Petersen
      • naked human
      • The Lowest Country
      • Towards Jerusalem
      • Nineteen Poems
    • Edvard Søderberg
  • Info
    • About My Poetry
    • About The Collections
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    • Poetry
    • Translations

I primarily translate poetry, and primarily from the languages: Danish, Swedish and German – into English.

I originally started translating poetry in order to make the works of Gustaf Munch-Petersen available in English – both so that I could share it with friends (and later, by extension, with the world at large), and as a sort of tribute. After translating his entire oeuvre, I went ahead with translating Edith Södergran in the same manner.

My other translations are more sporadic, and count poems that are meaningful to me – intended to stand on their own as they are.

I try my hardest to maintain the content of the poems without sacrifizing rhyme and meter – but if small alterations of the former are necessary in order to get the latter to work, I may choose to do so. I am, after all, a poet before I am a translator.

Category: Translations

  • Edith Södergran
  • Poems
12 Jan, 202012

Edith Södergran: The Mysterious Sea

Posted By K-M Skalkenæs

In the depths glide strange fishes,unknown flowers shine on the beach;I have seen red and yellow and all other colours, –but the vast, vast sea is the most dangerous to behold,it makes me thirsty and awoken for waiting adventures:what happens […]

  • Edith Södergran
  • Poems
12 Jan, 202012

Edith Södergran: The Mourning Garden

Posted By K-M Skalkenæs

Oh, to observe windowsand recall walls,that a garden can be knowingand a tree can turn around and ask:Who hasn’t come and what isn’t good,why is the emptiness heavy and says nothing?The bitter carnations stand close along the waywhere the darkness […]

  • Edith Södergran
  • Poems
12 Jan, 202012

Edith Södergran: Nordic Spring

Posted By K-M Skalkenæs

All my castles in the air have melted like snow,all my dreams have flowed away like water,out of everything I have loved I have but little left;a blue sky and some pale stars.The wind passes quietly through the trees.The emptiness […]

  • Edith Södergran
  • Poems
12 Jan, 202012

Edith Södergran: Early Morning

Posted By K-M Skalkenæs

The last stars of night shine faintly.I see them from my window. The sky is pale,you barely sense the day in the distance.A silence rests over the lake,a whisper lurks between the trees,my old garden listens absent-mindedlyto the breath of […]

  • Edith Södergran
  • Poems
12 Jan, 202012

Edith Södergran: We, Women

Posted By K-M Skalkenæs

We, women, we’re so close to the brown earth.We ask the cuckoo what it expects of the spring,we embrace the naked trunk of the firand search for signs and advice in the sunset. I loved a man once, he believed […]

  • Edith Södergran
  • Poems
12 Jan, 202012

Edith Södergran: The Light Daughter of the Forest

Posted By K-M Skalkenæs

Was it not yesterdaythe light daughter of the forest celebrated her weddingand everybody was so happy?She was the light bird and the bright spring,she was the hidden road and the laughing bush,she was the intoxicating, fearless summer night.She was immodest, […]

  • Edith Södergran
  • Poems
12 Jan, 202012

Edith Södergran: Joycat

Posted By K-M Skalkenæs

I have a joycat in my arms,it purrs and spins the thread of joy.Joycat, my joycat,get me these things:get me a golden ringthat says I’m happy;get me a mirrorthat says I’m beautiful,get me a fanthat waves away my sinister thoughts.Joycat, my joycat,purr […]

  • Edith Södergran
  • Poems
12 Jan, 202012

Edith Södergran: In the Vast Forest

Posted By K-M Skalkenæs

In the vast forest I long wandered lost,I sought the fairytales my childhood had heard. In the tall mountains I long wandered lost,I sought the dream-castles my youth had built. In my beloved’s garden I didn’t get lost,there sat the […]

  • Edith Södergran
  • Poems
12 Jan, 202012

Edith Södergran: Forest Darkness

Posted By K-M Skalkenæs

In the melancholy forestlives a sick god.In the dark forest the flowers are paleand the birds shy.Why is the wind full of warning whispersand the road dark with sinister premonitions?In the shadow lies the sick godand dreams bad dreams…

  • Edith Södergran
  • Poems
12 Jan, 202012

Edith Södergran: The Path To Happiness

Posted By K-M Skalkenæs

Nobody should understand itwhen the miraculous happens –there’s no road to happiness,nobody remembers a lucky paththat leads to the door of happiness. Oh, to chase the bird of happinessis to wander without pathsand to grasp without hands.To become king in […]

  • Edith Södergran
  • Poems
12 Jan, 202012

Edith Södergran: Words

Posted By K-M Skalkenæs

Warm words, beautiful words, deep words…They’re like the scent of a flower in the nightthat you can’t see.Behind them lurks an empty space…Perhaps they are the curling smokefrom the warm hearth of love?

  • Edith Södergran
  • Poems
12 Jan, 202012

Edith Södergran: The Starry Night

Posted By K-M Skalkenæs

Unnecessary suffering,unnecessary waiting,the world is as empty as your laughter.The stars are falling –cold and lovely night.Love smiles in its sleep,love dreams of eternity…Unnecessary fear, unnecessary pain,the world is less than nothing,down into the depths slides from the hand of […]

  • Edith Södergran
  • Poems
12 Jan, 202012

Edith Södergran: The Forest Lake

Posted By K-M Skalkenæs

I was alone at the light beachnear the pale blue forest lake,a lone cloud floated in the sky,on the water a lone island.The ripened sweetness of summerwas dripping from every tree,down into my open heart rana tiny droplet.

  • Edith Södergran
  • Poems
12 Jan, 202012

Edith Södergran: Wandering Clouds

Posted By K-M Skalkenæs

Wandering clouds are fastened along the mountainside,endless hours they stand in silence and wait:will a sudden wind scatter them across the plain,shall they rise with the sun high up above the snowcapped pinnacles?Wandering clouds block out the sun,the mourning flags […]

  • Edith Södergran
  • Poems
12 Jan, 202012

Edith Södergran: There’s a Candle In the Window

Posted By K-M Skalkenæs

There’s a candle in the windowthat slowly burnsand tells that somebody died in there.Some conifers silencearound a path that abruptly endsat a cemetery in mist.A bird chirps –who is in there?

  • Edith Södergran
  • Poems
12 Jan, 202012

Edith Södergran: Two Beach Poems

Posted By K-M Skalkenæs

I.My life was nakedlike the grey cliffs,my life was coldlike the white heights,but my youth sat with burning cheeksand cheered: the sun comes!And the sun came and I lay nakedall day long on the grey cliffs –a cold breath came […]

  • Edith Södergran
  • Poems
12 Jan, 202012

Edith Södergran: The Stars

Posted By K-M Skalkenæs

When the night comesI stand on the stair and listen,the stars are swarming in the gardenand I stand in the darkness.Listen; the sound of a falling star!Don’t walk barefoot out into the grass –my garden is full of splinters.

  • Edith Södergran
  • Poems
12 Jan, 202012

Edith Södergran: Black Or White?

Posted By K-M Skalkenæs

The rivers run under the bridges,the flowers shine alongside the roads,the forests bend themselves whispering to the ground.For me nothing is anymore high or low,black or white,for I have seen a whiteclad womanin my lover’s arm.

  • Edith Södergran
  • Poems
12 Jan, 202012

Edith Södergran: Autumn

Posted By K-M Skalkenæs

The naked trees stand around my houseand let in sky and air without pause,the naked trees move down to the beachand reflect themselves in the water.Still a child plays in the grey smoke of autumnand a girl walks with flowers […]

  • Edith Södergran
  • Poems
12 Jan, 202012

Edith Södergran: The Pale Lake of Autumn

Posted By K-M Skalkenæs

The pale lake of autumndreams heavy dreamsof a spring-white islandthat sunk into the sea. Pale lake of autumn,how your ripples hide,how your mirror forgetsdays must die. The pale lake of autumncarries its high sky lightly and quietlylike life and death […]

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  • 30 after thoughts
  • divisive / dismissive / missive
  • Light Requires Darkness
  • Seen From a Distance People Lose Their Eyes
  • De spor man efterlader sig
  • Confessions of the Cold Light of Dawn
  • What Bits of Peace My Life’s Ensured
  • Poems Inspired by Paintings
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