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Niels Hav : The Poet

Epigram

Women of Copenhagen

Visit from My Father

In Defense of Poets

Comment

Poet Niels Hav:

Niels Hav is a poet and short story writer, living in Copenhagen with his wife, Pianist Christina Bj?rk?e. He has traveled widely in Europe, Asia, North and South America. His work has been translated into several languages, including English, Spanish, Portuguese, Turkish and Italian. His credits include five Volumes of poetry and three short story collections. He's also been the Recipient of several national awards. His forthcoming book is an English translation of Here We Are, published by Book Thug. The original Danish follows each poem.

Morocco Today is now opening a window of this creative poet to discover his verses. We found his poetry beautiful, his images and scenery alive, the title of the poem attractive, and the themes new for the common readers.

Epigram

You can spend an entire life
in the company of words
not ever finding

the right one.

Just like a wretched fish
wrapped in Hungarian newspapers.
For one thing it is dead,
for another it doesn't understand
Hungarian!

Translation: Per K. Brask & Niels Hav

© Niels Hav

In Defense of Poets

By Niels Hav

What are we to do about the poets?
Life's rough on them
they look so pitiful dressed in black
their skin blue from internal blizzards

Poetry is a horrible disease,
the infected walk about complaining
their screams pollute the atmosphere like leaks
from atomic power stations of the mind. It's so psychotic
Poetry is a tyrant
it keeps people awake at night and destroys marriages
it draws people out to desolate cottages in mid-winter
where they sit in pain wearing earmuffs and thick scarves.
Imagine the torture.

Poetry is a pest
worse than gonorrhea, a terrible abomination.
But consider poets it's hard for them
bear with them!
They are hysterical as if they are expecting twins
they gnash their teeth while sleeping, they eat dirt
and grass. They stay out in the howling wind for hours
tormented by astounding metaphors.
Every day is a holy day for them.

Oh please, take pity on the poets
they are deaf and blind
help them through traffic where they stagger about
with their invisible handicap
remembering all sorts of stuff. Now and then one of them stops
to listen for a distant siren.
Show consideration for them.

Poets are like insane children
who've been chased from their homes by the entire family.
Pray for them
they are born unhappy
their mothers have cried for them
sought the assistance of doctors and lawyers, until they had to give up
for fear of loosing their own minds.
Oh, cry for the poets!

Nothing can save them.
Infested with poetry like secret lepers
they are incarcerated in their own fantasy world
a gruesome ghetto filled with demons
and vindictive ghosts.

When on a clear summer's day the sun shining brightly
you see a poor poet
come wobbling out of the apartment block, looking pale
like a cadaver and disfigured by speculations
then walk up and help him.
Tie his shoelaces, lead him to the park
and help him sit down on the bench
in the sun. Sing to him a little
buy him an ice cream and tell him a story
because he's so sad.
He's completely ruined by poetry.

.

Transleted by Per Brask & Patrick Friesen

Visit from My Father

By: Niels \Hav

My dead Father comes to visit
and sits down in his chair again, the one I got.
"Well, Niels!" he says.
He is brown and strong, his hair shines like black
lacquer.
Once he moved other people's gravestones around
using a steel rod and a wheelbarrow, I helped him.
Now he's moved his own
by himself. "How's it going"? he says.
I tell him all of it,
my plans, all the unsuccessful attempts.
On my bulletin board hang seventeen bills.
"Throw them away",
he says, they'll come back again"!
He laughs.
"For many years I was hard on myself",
he says, "I lie awake mulling
to become a decent person.
That's important"!
I offer him a cigarette,
but he has stopped smoking now.
Outside the sun sets fire to the roofs and chimneys,
the garbagemen make noise and yell to each other
on the street. My father gets up,
goes to the window and looks down at them.
"They are busy", he says, "that's good.
Do something!"
Translated by Per K. Brask & Patrick Friesen

Epigramme

Un poem de Niels Hav

On peut passer toute une vie

en compagnie des mots

sans trouver

le bon.

Comme un pauvre poisson

enveloppé dans des journaux hongrois:

D'abord, il est mort.

En plus, il ne comprend pas

le hongrois.

Invitation

Morocco is a beautiful country, its literature is more beautiful but unknown. Therefore, we are opening here a window on Moroccan literature, specially that written in English. For most of you, it will be a window of new, strange, unbelievable realities, yes, realities but unbelievable, while in Morocco it is business as usual.

We invite our readers, and lovers of literaturein general, to provide uswith their comments aand feedback, to enrich this page and to establish a cultural dialogue with various parties.

Morocco Today Editorial Board

Niels Hav

Translated from the Danish by Patrick Friesen and P.K. Brask

When his collection Grundstof, from which most of the poems was published in 2004, it was welcomed in one of

Denmark’s most widely read newspapers Ekstra Bladet with these

Words: ‘Niels Hav is an economical writer. He only inconveniences

the public when he has something important on his mind. Hav’s aim

is to give weight to every word and to cut to the bone. It’s been

ten years since his last book, but when he finally does publish

what’s on the page actually says something. Grundstof‘s words are

Saturated with experience and wisdom.’

The English translations of his poems in We Are Here are no

different: they address what Hav considers to be elemental about

Life that undeniable essence without which everything makes

little sense. His voice is direct and humorous, intelligent,

lyrical and philosophical: a voice that takes into account the

difficulties of staying close to the elemental. Hav is devoid of

sly obfuscation; he is a poet unafraid of being clear. What could

be more direct or elemental than the fact that We Are Here?

Niels Hav is a poet and short story writer living in Copenhagen.

He has published five books of poetry and three collections of

short fiction. An earlier English edition of Hav’s work titled

God’s Blue Morris was published in Canada in 1992 and the team of

Friesen and Brask were also the translators for this collection.

Hav’s work has appeared in other languages as well, including

English, Spanish, Italian, Turkish, and Portuguese. Some of his poems wee recently translated into Arabic and published in www.moroccotoday.net. A collection

also appeared in Macedonian published by Spektar Press. Next year

a collection will appear in Istanbul, Turkey. Hav has been the

recipient of a number of prestigious awards. He has travelled

widely in Europe, Asia, North and South America. He is married

with four children.

Patrick Friesen is a poet, playwright, essayist and translator who

lives in Vancouver. He has collaborated in the translation of

three volumes of Danish poetry with P. K. Brask. Friesen teaches

at Kwantlen University College. His web site is

www.patrickfriesen.com.

P.K. Brask is a translator of poetry, drama and short fiction who

has collaborated with Patrick Friesen on three collections of

Danish poetry. He is Professor of Theatre and Film at the

University of Winnipeg.

Readers' Comment

I have read the poems. It's the first time I have read a poem written by Poet Niels Hav.

i really appreciated the work: the use of imagery, the rhythm of verses, the choice of words and above all the simplicity of expression...

i appreciated most the poem entitled "In Defense of Poets" and i feel ready to translate it into Arabic and publish it on the arabic widely-read magazines , newspapers and electronic websites. i just need permission and i am waiting for it.

best regards

mohamed said raihani

Women of Copenhagen
By Niels Hav

I have once again fallen in love
this time with five different women during a ride
on the number 40 bus from Njalsgade to ?sterbro.
How is one to gain control of one’s life under such conditions?
One wore a fur coat, another red wellingtons.
One of them was reading a newspaper, the other Heidegger
--and the streets were flooded with rain.
At Amager Boulevard a drenched princess entered,
euphoric and furious, and I fell for her utterly.
But she jumped off at the police station
and was replaced by two queens with flaming kerchiefs,
who spoke shrilly with each other in Pakistani
all the way to the Municipal Hospital while the bus boiled
in poetry. They were sisters and equally beautiful,
so I lost my heart to both of them and immediately planned
a new life in a village near Rawalpindi
where children grow up in the scent of hibiscus
while their desperate mothers sing heartbreaking songs
as dusk settles over the Pakistani plains.
But they didn’t see me!
And the one wearing a fur coat cried beneath
her glove when she got off at Farimagsgade.
The girl reading Heidegger suddenly shut her book
and looked directly at me with a dirisive smile,
as if she’d suddenly caught a glimpse of Mr. Nobody
in his very own insignificance.
And that’s how my heart broke for the fifth time,
when she got up and left the bus with all the others.
Life is so brutal!
I continued for two more stops before giving up.
It always ends like that: You stand alone
on the kerb, sucking on a cigarette,
wound up and mildly unhappy.
the scent of hibiscus

It always ends like that: You stand alone

on the kerb, sucking on a cigarette,

wound up and mildly unhappy.