translated by Nancy Naomi Carlson
I stir the spoon in the cup
and drink a liquid cloudless sky
dilated time shows its scars
a frieze of water and blooms
day dawns quick as a wave of the hand
God’s hand or manna from skies?
Une carte du ciel
Je touille la cuillère dans la tasse
et bois un ciel liquide et sans nuage
le temps dilaté montre ses cicatrices
une frise d’eau et de
le jour se lève en un tournemain
la main de Dieu ou la manne des cieux?
Published in Cider Press Review, Volume 16, Issue 1.
Abdourahman Waberi is a prize-winning poet, novelist, and short story writer from Djibouti, a tiny country in the Horn of Africa, about the size of Massachusetts. He was awarded the Grand prix littéraure de l’Afrique noire (Grand Prize for Black African Literature), and represented Djibouti at the 2012 Olympic’s Poetry Parnassus.
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Nancy Naomi Carlson is a recent recipient of an NEA Literature Translation fellowship, as well as grants from the Maryland Arts Council and the Arts & Humanities Council of Montgomery County. She is a senior translation editor for Tupelo Quarterly, and the author of Stone Lyre: Poems of René Char.
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