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Poetry

from “Third-Millennium Heart”

By Ursula Andkjær Olsen
Translated from Danish by Katrine Øgaard Jensen
Listen to Ursula Andkjaer Olsen read from "Third-Millennium Heart"
 
 

The will to have no openings, to avoid areas where humiliation and
assault take place.

In terms of the blood stream, not wanting infrastructure, it’s
the same. Sun chariot and moon chariot wheel
at the slightest external touch, transporting bright
shiny humiliations within the corpus and
abracadabra out into every screaming corner.

I use expensive drops: anger’s sweat, tablet, pastille, ointment. Balm. Brew
three bags for a pot of coma.

With a rock I block the cave’s mouth; nobody coming out, nobody coming
in, nothing will resurrect, that name, that knife in the back will

never again slip through my paranoia-carcass.
I will remain unwritten.

From Det 3. årtusindes hjerte © Ursula Andkjær Olsen. By arrangement with the author. Translation © 2015 by Katrine Øgaard Jensen. All rights reserved.

English

The will to have no openings, to avoid areas where humiliation and
assault take place.

In terms of the blood stream, not wanting infrastructure, it’s
the same. Sun chariot and moon chariot wheel
at the slightest external touch, transporting bright
shiny humiliations within the corpus and
abracadabra out into every screaming corner.

I use expensive drops: anger’s sweat, tablet, pastille, ointment. Balm. Brew
three bags for a pot of coma.

With a rock I block the cave’s mouth; nobody coming out, nobody coming
in, nothing will resurrect, that name, that knife in the back will

never again slip through my paranoia-carcass.
I will remain unwritten.

From Det 3. årtusindes hjerte © Ursula Andkjær Olsen. By arrangement with the author. Translation © 2015 by Katrine Øgaard Jensen. All rights reserved.

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