wuirds/words
efter louis-ferdinand céline, via the Scots
|
at the stert o it aa there wis feelin the wuird wis-na there wi aa when ye kittle an amoeba a bairn greits oorsels juist the wuird is uggsome ti ventur sic is ill-faurt |
in the beginning there was sensation the word was not there at all when you tickle an amoeba a baby cries only us the word is disgusting to attempt it is ill-advised |
Author’s note: “wuirds/words” is a more or less straightforward found poem, taken from an interview given before his death (1961) by Louis-Ferdinand Céline, the whole of which appeared in another translation several years after the event (1964) in The Paris Review. The poem was originally rendered from the French into Scots, which I’ve subsequently translated into English. The poem itself speaks of the difficulty (impossibility?) of translating the subjective immediacy of phenomena into the social institution of language.
Andrew McCallum is a Scottish poet and scallywag with a distant background in European philosophy.
