Four Poems

Marine Petrossian

The Stranger Holding a Submachine Gun

When I reach the end of the street I will die
near the white building there stands a stranger holding a submachine gun
I wish I could walk on a different street but this is the only one
once they were telling us about another street now we know it was not true
this is the only street and at the end of it there stands a stranger holding a submachine gun

I walk the street very very fast and the buildings look at me in surprise
they say—Marine where are you going you will die
the trees tug at my clothes trying to embrace me
they plead—let us take you to another street
but I know there is no other street
once they were telling us about another street now we know it was not true
this is the only street and at the end of it there stands a stranger holding a submachine gun

 

The Sun and The Black Dog

In that city
I had no friends or acquaintances
but they knew
what I knew about Homer
they knew Homer was blind
and he died a long time ago
a very long time ago
but there was a
there was a Homer
like I am
and you are
like there was Achilles
there was Helen too
and Hector
although I did not know a person in the city
although I did not speak their language
nor were the Greeks speaking mine
but I knew so well the sun when it rose
every morning
and I knew so well the sadness
that suddenly appeared without warning
and compressed my heart
like the fate
who once appeared before Oedipus
as a black dog
 


This is the Door

What a brilliant December
brilliant like snow
brilliant like the sun
brilliant like your old dream

Do you remember that girl?
the one that was small and stubborn
the one that stood behind the door
behind the giant door and wanted to open it
but she could not reach the handle
her little hand could not reach the handle

Here’s that door
just in front of you
if you reach out your hand you can open it
but do not hurry, Marine
quiet, be a bit quiet
you are not little anymore
you are not little at all
and your heart may not stand it
when the door finally opens
and your old dream—
brilliant like the snow
brilliant like the sun—
stands in front of you
 


For Arthur, after Naira Died

We come
we do not know from where
we go
we do not know where
and stuck between is our life
sometimes happy
but even more sad
and stuck between are people
thousands and thousands
millions and millions
don’t ask them anything
they don’t have the answer
they—like you
came from a place unknown
they—like you
are going to a place unknown
and if you
just lost the one
some of them maybe
have never had
that only one
with whom this life
is more happy
than it is sad

translated from the Armenian by Arthur Kayzakian

Read the original in Armenian

Listen to the poems read in the original Armenian by the poet:

In my conversations with Marine Petrossian about how to approach the translation of her work, we decided that a literal translation (word for word) was best. Marine Petrossian’s poems should not be read lightly. Her minimalistic style is part of her method, since each line holds a weight of grief. There is no need to decorate the translation with metaphor, simile, or variations in phrasing, since her lines are so vivid. Her poems read like a direct report, written from a necessary distance so as to expose the dire circumstances of Armenian life. In translating her work, I have found that writing with precise simplicity is not an easy thing to do. The Armenian language is poetic and musical. A direct translation makes the conversion “charming,” as Petrossian said to me, and surreal due to the often awkward, yet startling, phrasing my translations produced. I intended to capture every Armenian word because I instinctually felt the poems would be mangled enough in English to reveal the devastating, yet raw, beautiful experiences in Petrossian’s work. I wanted to honor Petrossian’s sense of imagery and experience by retaining the quality of surprise she offers. I enjoyed this process and would love to work with Petrossian again. My literal translations of Petrossian’s work taught me to use minimal language and puncture the reader with urgency in my work. I am forever grateful to have worked with a poet like Marine Petrossian, who is both generous and brilliant.

Marine Petrossian is an Armenian poet and essayist. Her first book appeared in 1993, just two years after the Soviet Union had collapsed and Armenia, formerly part of it, had become an independent republic. The poems of the book were translated into French by Vahé Godel (J'Apporterai des pierres; Editions Comp'Act, 1995). Encouraged by success of the book (a favorable review, among others, was published in Le Monde) Editions Comp’Act soon published another translation of Petrossian's poems by Godel (Erevan, 2003). Since then, Petrossian has published another four volumes of poetry in Armenia. In 2015 the Argentinian publishing house Audisea Editora published Petrossian’s book Disparó el arma in Spanish, translated by Alice Ter-Ghevondian. Petrossian’s essay “Antipoetry, or When the Poet Does Not Seek an Alibi” has aroused intense discussions in Armenian literary circles. In this essay Petrossian asserts “antipoetry”—poetry that does not look like poetry—to be the leading tendency in contemporary Armenian writing.

Arthur Kayzakian is the winner of the 2021 Black Lawrence Immigrant Writing Series award for his collection The Book of Redacted Paintings, which was also selected as a finalist for the 2021 Philip Levine Prize for Poetry. He is also the winner of the Finishing Line Press Open Chapbook Competition for his chapbook My Burning City. He has been a finalist for the Locked Horn Press Chapbook Prize, Two Sylvias Press Chapbook Prize, the C.D. Wright Prize, the Sunken Garden Poetry Prize, and the Black River Chapbook Competition. He is a contributing editor at Poetry International and a recipient of the Minas Savvas Fellowship. He serves as the Poetry Chair for the International Armenian Literary Alliance (IALA). His work has appeared in or is forthcoming from several publications, including The Adroit Journal, Portland Review, Chicago Review, Nat. Brut, Michigan Quarterly Review, Witness Magazine, and Prairie Schooner.