Erato - Love Poetry

I taught a poetry-writing class at a local library again today. At first, I thought no one would show for the class (a few students did trickle in at the 20 minute mark), so I jotted down a few notes about Dictee:

I found the "Erato Love Poetry" section extremely powerful, and I admired the way it operates as a sort of split screen, with two (or more) interwoven narratives, one on the left page and one on the right. It forces the reader to navigate the pages in an unusual way, moving down, not across. So many types of love are explored -- husband and wife (or lack thereof), mother and chile, love for God (nun as bride of Jesus).

In particular, I'm starting to notice the various treatments of the mother-daughter relationship -- Cha and her own mother, Demeter and Persephone.

---

I was very pleased with my work as a would-be translator last night. (I had decided I didn't like a particular translation of Pablo Neruda's "Puedo escribir los versos..." and, with my high school Spanish and an assist from BabelFish, I produced a translation more to my liking. It feels more faithful to the original text, more accurate to its rhythms.)

Anyway, I found myself doing the same thing as I read Dictee, comparing the French and English, noticing places where Cha deviated in phrasing or (especially) line breaks. Wondering why she did so. No, I haven't learned French overnight, but it is possible to compare two texts and notice different line-breaks, and French and English share so many words (we have William I and the Norman conquerors to thank) that it is really possible to compare the texts even without being able to read French.