In his last years, when he had moved back to Kraków, we worked on the translation of his poems by e-mail and phone. Around the time of his ninetieth birthday, he sent me a set of poems entitled “Oh!” I wrote to ask him if he meant “Oh!” or “O!” and he asked me what the difference was and said that perhaps we should talk on the phone. On the phone I explained that “Oh!” was a long breath of wonder, that the equivalent was, possibly, “Wow!” and that “O!” was a caught breath of wonder and surprise, more like “Huh!” and he said, after a pause, “O! for sure.” Here are the translations we made:
O!
1.
O happiness! To see an iris.
The color of indigo, as Ella’s skin was once, and the delicate scent was like that of her skin.
O what a mumbling to describe an iris that was blooming when Ella did not exist, nor all our kingdoms, nor all our desmesnes!
2.
GUSTAV KLIMT (1883–1918)
Judith I (detail)
OESTERREICHISCHE GALERIE
O lips half opened, eyes half closed, the rosy nipple of your unveiled nakedness, Judith!
And they, rushing forward in an attack with your image preserved in their memories, torn apart by bursts of artillery shells, falling down into pits, into putrefaction.
O the massive gold of your brocade, of your necklace with its rows of precious stones, Judith, for such a farewell.
3.
SALVATOR ROSA (1615–1673)
A Landscape with Figures
YALE UNIVERSITY MUSEUM
O the quiet of water under the rocks, and the yellow silence of the afternoon, and flat white clouds reflected!
Figures in the foreground dressing themselves after bathing, figures on the other shore tiny, and in their activities mysterious.
O most ordinary, taken from dailiness and elevated to a place like this earth and not like this earth!
4.
EDWARD HOPPER (1882–1967)
A Hotel Room
THYSSEN-BORNEMISZA COLLECTION, LUGANO
O what sadness unaware that it’s sadness!
What despair that doesn’t know it’s despair!
A business woman, her unpacked suitcase on the floor, sits on a bed half undressed, in red underwear, her hair impeccable; she has a piece of paper in her hand, probably with numbers.
Who are you? Nobody will ask. She doesn’t know either.