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Poetry

Kaddish: For Miklós Radnóti

By Radu Vancu
Translated from Romanian by Sean Cotter
Romanian poet Radu Vancu channels the Hungarian poet Miklós Radnóti, murdered in the Holocaust.
An ivory background with water stains
Photo by Annie Spratt on Unsplash

My love after you pulled my body from the common
grave you found in my front coat pocket the notebook

with my last poems It was wet From the wet earth And from my body
that rotted & soaked the paper You dried them in the sun You sat

by the notebook & you waited for it to dry to see if the
poems could be read I thought you watched my body

evaporate from the notebook It evaporated from the poems And it was
a little strange that poems could appear only if my body evaporated

from them It was springtime I evaporated quickly & the poems
started to appear You read them & I watched you at the same time from

the air above where I had evaporated & from the common grave
where I was left & from the poems You didn’t cry But I did You were

surprised to see the notebook wet again You started to blow on
it On me The more you blew the wetter the notebook got You put it

in your pocket The heat of your body made me evaporate much
faster than the sun did The way sometimes I evaporated

from the sun & little death that rose together on your
face when you came When you took it back out just a minute later perfectly

dry you didn’t understand it I don’t either my love I am
looking at you from the common grave Or maybe from

the poems In fact from both The air around you is me If
you feel the air & light suddenly make a kind of wet salt don’t

be afraid It’s just me It’s just a poem

*

(If the light cries at what I write
it doesn’t mean that I’m alive)

*

I could avoid remembering you my love but
simple things aren’t worth doing Simple is a heart

when it dies it dies Simple is a brain
when it stops it stops

But a common grave is never simple Here everything simmers
even the blood Like in poetry Like in love You

were always our common grave my love In the first
seconds we went even further than blood

*

(Just because I write these poems
doesn’t mean that I’m alive)

*

It’s beautiful, the way hearts rise over our common
grave says Miklós Shhh say the dead let’s not scare them

And we forget how hearts slide past above us
like fish of light Tight lines someone shouts from the

edge You scared them off you idiot shouts another
They’re not scared dummy Some hearts drift lower

nearer The dead fidget like orphans on an adoption visit
I hear her says Miklós it’s you Fanni Your heart is a salmon

of light It descends among the dead & starts to swim
toward me

*

My love when my flesh melted & saturated
the notebook in my pocket I knew that I had never

betrayed you more horribly Only your flesh had I ever entered
the way I did this paper No The opposite Only your flesh ever entered

me so deeply I soaked & waited for the
pages to start singing right there in the grave

the common grave The way my flesh sang after you soaked into it
The way it sang ceaselessly from when I saw you at the tram station

near Keleti & until the bullet went in my
neck here at Abda near Győr You won’t believe

me when I say the bullet passing through a brain soaked in
you began to sing But the whole common grave will be

my witness it happened So there’s this small problem
the pages didn’t sing here with the bones The song

would have made us forget we’d lost our flesh Like
we did before to forget we had flesh After about 2 months

they took me out of the grave you were already back in Budapest on
Pozsony in our bed You took out the notebook from which

I had evaporated & you put it beside you in bed & you
opened it It started to sing like a music box You

lay there & listened carefully to ceaseless singing
from then june 1946 to february 2014 when

you got up from the bed & closed the notebook & came down here
beside me You embraced me & we started to soak into

each other quietly like into the ground Like into paper The common
grave suddenly began to sing like a

music box

*

The way you made Flammkuchen & got angry at the oven that
always burnt the bottom Even though you loved crispy things

The way you poured me more coffee from the ibrik
Even though you loved coffee The way you always gave me the

bigger share of crème brûlée Even though you loved that too The way
you translated Nerval’s Aurélia & you got angry that he killed himself

before finishing it Even though you loved suicides The way you tried
to moan as little as possible when you came Even though you loved sex The

way you got angry when I came silently Even though
you loved silence The way you got angry you were 3 years younger

than me I’m obviously the older one you said
(You were right I would die at 35 & you at 102)

All this illuminates the common grave blindingly Almost as
much as you on sad days illuminated the grave below the sky

*

My attempt to catch light in phrases. Because, as Erigena says somewhere, omnia quae sunt, lumina sunt.

This is why I asked poetry to take words & build instruments to capture light & beauty. A word regulator to focus their light until it becomes incandescent. Beauty is hard, as the ancient Greeks said & Yeats & Pound. But it’s the only meaning I can find for literature: to capture in words light & beauty. To use words like instruments for the eyes, not the ears; like instruments for sight, not hearing.

This is why I believe in literature that we see, that shines on the page like the play of light.

*

I know what you’re wondering Yes they shot me here at Abda
near Győr Yes here is our common grave next to the

memorial Yes Fanni found me here after 2 years & moved
me to the Kerepesi cemetery in Budapest But I am

still in the common grave in Abda I still write in the common
grave Impossible to write anywhere else I know what you’re

wondering Yes And you are reading me in the common
grave And the Starbucks where Vancu writes about

us is also the common grave And the pictures today from
the Webb telescope are also in the common grave Our bones

here in Abda are no less colorful
& sexy than the pictures of a universe that’s been dead for 13

billion years Hi My name is Universe & I am a common
grave Hi My name is Literature & I am a common

grave Hi My name is Radnóti We know We know the bones
shout From the pyramids to Google Photos all we’ve done is

invent common graves for ourselves So yes That’s how it is Beside
these poems you lie beside a common grave

When you read them you disinter someone The bones in
them were alive & will be alive again But don’t be scared From

here no one can move us If you read these poems
your bones & our bones will be happy & laugh together

in their grave We will watch together someone push
select all for all the images in the world Including

the ones from the Webb telescope & the first images of the universe
We will then watch someone push delete forever We will

then listen carefully We will hear without much work how the bones
yours & ours laugh together here in the common grave

*

Carolyn Forché & her 1993 anthology, Against Forgetting: around 150 twentieth-century poems of witness, poems about totalitarian & genocidal horrors, beginning with the Armenian genocide & ending with the wars in Yugoslavia.

That is where I found Rádnoti Miklós—the notebook where he wrote his last poems was discovered in his pocket, after he was exhumed from the common grave where the Nazis dumped him. And where only the stubborn love of his wife, Fanni Gyarmati, could find him. The paper was soaked with the fluids of his decomposing body; they let the paper dry in the sun—and there reappeared some of the most awful & most luminous poems a human being has ever written.

In his poems, Rádnoti recorded the prisoners’ forced march, executions on that road from the copper mines, in the Serbian city of Bor, toward Hungary (including the execution of his friend, the violinist Lorsi Miklós, shot in the back of the neck, “the way you will die, too, in a few days,” as Rádnoti wrote on the last day of October, 1944; & that’s exactly how it happened—they shot him in the back of the neck a few days later), memories of Fanni (blindingly illuminated—epiphanies in the strongest, utterly sacred, sense of the word).

Fanni lived another 70 years, until February 2014. She did not remarry. After her death, her journal of 1,300 pages appeared, where she talked about 1935–46, years she had never discussed before. She made this journal appear out of nothing—just as she had brought his poetry back from the grave. She is the absolute hero of this poem, of this combination of nekya & kaddish.

In the paper of Rádnoti’s poems, soaked in his flesh & brain & heart, all humanity is saturated.

(Only when the paper is soaked in your body can you say you actually write.)

From “Kaddish.” Copyright © 2023 by Radu Vancu. By arrangement with the author. Translation copyright © 2023 by Sean Cotter. All rights reserved.

English Romanian (Original)

My love after you pulled my body from the common
grave you found in my front coat pocket the notebook

with my last poems It was wet From the wet earth And from my body
that rotted & soaked the paper You dried them in the sun You sat

by the notebook & you waited for it to dry to see if the
poems could be read I thought you watched my body

evaporate from the notebook It evaporated from the poems And it was
a little strange that poems could appear only if my body evaporated

from them It was springtime I evaporated quickly & the poems
started to appear You read them & I watched you at the same time from

the air above where I had evaporated & from the common grave
where I was left & from the poems You didn’t cry But I did You were

surprised to see the notebook wet again You started to blow on
it On me The more you blew the wetter the notebook got You put it

in your pocket The heat of your body made me evaporate much
faster than the sun did The way sometimes I evaporated

from the sun & little death that rose together on your
face when you came When you took it back out just a minute later perfectly

dry you didn’t understand it I don’t either my love I am
looking at you from the common grave Or maybe from

the poems In fact from both The air around you is me If
you feel the air & light suddenly make a kind of wet salt don’t

be afraid It’s just me It’s just a poem

*

(If the light cries at what I write
it doesn’t mean that I’m alive)

*

I could avoid remembering you my love but
simple things aren’t worth doing Simple is a heart

when it dies it dies Simple is a brain
when it stops it stops

But a common grave is never simple Here everything simmers
even the blood Like in poetry Like in love You

were always our common grave my love In the first
seconds we went even further than blood

*

(Just because I write these poems
doesn’t mean that I’m alive)

*

It’s beautiful, the way hearts rise over our common
grave says Miklós Shhh say the dead let’s not scare them

And we forget how hearts slide past above us
like fish of light Tight lines someone shouts from the

edge You scared them off you idiot shouts another
They’re not scared dummy Some hearts drift lower

nearer The dead fidget like orphans on an adoption visit
I hear her says Miklós it’s you Fanni Your heart is a salmon

of light It descends among the dead & starts to swim
toward me

*

My love when my flesh melted & saturated
the notebook in my pocket I knew that I had never

betrayed you more horribly Only your flesh had I ever entered
the way I did this paper No The opposite Only your flesh ever entered

me so deeply I soaked & waited for the
pages to start singing right there in the grave

the common grave The way my flesh sang after you soaked into it
The way it sang ceaselessly from when I saw you at the tram station

near Keleti & until the bullet went in my
neck here at Abda near Győr You won’t believe

me when I say the bullet passing through a brain soaked in
you began to sing But the whole common grave will be

my witness it happened So there’s this small problem
the pages didn’t sing here with the bones The song

would have made us forget we’d lost our flesh Like
we did before to forget we had flesh After about 2 months

they took me out of the grave you were already back in Budapest on
Pozsony in our bed You took out the notebook from which

I had evaporated & you put it beside you in bed & you
opened it It started to sing like a music box You

lay there & listened carefully to ceaseless singing
from then june 1946 to february 2014 when

you got up from the bed & closed the notebook & came down here
beside me You embraced me & we started to soak into

each other quietly like into the ground Like into paper The common
grave suddenly began to sing like a

music box

*

The way you made Flammkuchen & got angry at the oven that
always burnt the bottom Even though you loved crispy things

The way you poured me more coffee from the ibrik
Even though you loved coffee The way you always gave me the

bigger share of crème brûlée Even though you loved that too The way
you translated Nerval’s Aurélia & you got angry that he killed himself

before finishing it Even though you loved suicides The way you tried
to moan as little as possible when you came Even though you loved sex The

way you got angry when I came silently Even though
you loved silence The way you got angry you were 3 years younger

than me I’m obviously the older one you said
(You were right I would die at 35 & you at 102)

All this illuminates the common grave blindingly Almost as
much as you on sad days illuminated the grave below the sky

*

My attempt to catch light in phrases. Because, as Erigena says somewhere, omnia quae sunt, lumina sunt.

This is why I asked poetry to take words & build instruments to capture light & beauty. A word regulator to focus their light until it becomes incandescent. Beauty is hard, as the ancient Greeks said & Yeats & Pound. But it’s the only meaning I can find for literature: to capture in words light & beauty. To use words like instruments for the eyes, not the ears; like instruments for sight, not hearing.

This is why I believe in literature that we see, that shines on the page like the play of light.

*

I know what you’re wondering Yes they shot me here at Abda
near Győr Yes here is our common grave next to the

memorial Yes Fanni found me here after 2 years & moved
me to the Kerepesi cemetery in Budapest But I am

still in the common grave in Abda I still write in the common
grave Impossible to write anywhere else I know what you’re

wondering Yes And you are reading me in the common
grave And the Starbucks where Vancu writes about

us is also the common grave And the pictures today from
the Webb telescope are also in the common grave Our bones

here in Abda are no less colorful
& sexy than the pictures of a universe that’s been dead for 13

billion years Hi My name is Universe & I am a common
grave Hi My name is Literature & I am a common

grave Hi My name is Radnóti We know We know the bones
shout From the pyramids to Google Photos all we’ve done is

invent common graves for ourselves So yes That’s how it is Beside
these poems you lie beside a common grave

When you read them you disinter someone The bones in
them were alive & will be alive again But don’t be scared From

here no one can move us If you read these poems
your bones & our bones will be happy & laugh together

in their grave We will watch together someone push
select all for all the images in the world Including

the ones from the Webb telescope & the first images of the universe
We will then watch someone push delete forever We will

then listen carefully We will hear without much work how the bones
yours & ours laugh together here in the common grave

*

Carolyn Forché & her 1993 anthology, Against Forgetting: around 150 twentieth-century poems of witness, poems about totalitarian & genocidal horrors, beginning with the Armenian genocide & ending with the wars in Yugoslavia.

That is where I found Rádnoti Miklós—the notebook where he wrote his last poems was discovered in his pocket, after he was exhumed from the common grave where the Nazis dumped him. And where only the stubborn love of his wife, Fanni Gyarmati, could find him. The paper was soaked with the fluids of his decomposing body; they let the paper dry in the sun—and there reappeared some of the most awful & most luminous poems a human being has ever written.

In his poems, Rádnoti recorded the prisoners’ forced march, executions on that road from the copper mines, in the Serbian city of Bor, toward Hungary (including the execution of his friend, the violinist Lorsi Miklós, shot in the back of the neck, “the way you will die, too, in a few days,” as Rádnoti wrote on the last day of October, 1944; & that’s exactly how it happened—they shot him in the back of the neck a few days later), memories of Fanni (blindingly illuminated—epiphanies in the strongest, utterly sacred, sense of the word).

Fanni lived another 70 years, until February 2014. She did not remarry. After her death, her journal of 1,300 pages appeared, where she talked about 1935–46, years she had never discussed before. She made this journal appear out of nothing—just as she had brought his poetry back from the grave. She is the absolute hero of this poem, of this combination of nekya & kaddish.

In the paper of Rádnoti’s poems, soaked in his flesh & brain & heart, all humanity is saturated.

(Only when the paper is soaked in your body can you say you actually write.)

Dragostea mea după ce mi-ai scos corpul din groapa
comună mi-ai găsit în buzunarul din față al hainei carnetul

cu ultimele poezii Era ud De la pământul ud Dar și de la corpul
meu putrezit & îmbibat în hârtie L-ai uscat la soare Stăteai

lângă carnet & așteptai să se usuce ca să vezi dacă se
pot citi poeziile M-am gândit că te uitai la corpul meu

cum se evaporă din carnet Cum se evaporă din poezii Și era
un pic straniu că poeziile se vedeau numai dacă se evapora

corpul meu din ele Era vară M-am evaporat repede & poeziile
au început să se vadă Le citeai & te priveam în același timp din

aerul de deasupra unde mă evaporasem & din groapa comună
unde rămăsesem & din poezii Nu ai plâns Dar am plâns eu Te-ai

uitat mirată cum carnetul se udă iar Ai început să sufli peste
el Peste mine Cu cât suflai carnetul se uda mai tare L-ai pus

în buzunar M-am evaporat de la căldura corpului tău mult
mai repede decât de la soare Cum mă evaporam uneori

de la soarele & moartea dulce care-ți răsăreau împreună
pe față la orgasm Când l-ai scos peste nici un minut perfect

uscat se vedea că nu înțelegi nimic Nici eu nu înțeleg dragostea
mea Te privesc chiar acum din groapa comună Sau poate din

poezii De fapt din amândouă Aerul din jurul tău sunt eu Dacă
simți cum aerul & lumina se fac deodată un fel de sare udă să

nu te sperii Sunt doar eu E doar poezie

– – – – – – – – – –

(Doar pentru că lumina plânge de la ce scriu
nu înseamnă că sunt viu)

– – – – – – – – – –

Aș putea să nu-mi aduc aminte de tine dragostea mea dar
lucrurile simple nu merită făcute Simplă e inima

care când moare a și murit Simplu e creierul
care când se oprește chiar s-a oprit

Dar groapa comună nu-i niciodată simplă Aici totul forfotește
până dincolo de sânge Ca-n poezie Ca-n dragoste Tu

dintotdeauna ai fost groapa noastră comună dragostea
mea Noi am trecut din prima secundă dincolo de sânge

– – – – – – – – – –

(Doar pentru că scriu poemele astea
nu înseamnă că sunt viu)

– – – – – – – – – –

Ce frumos răsar inimile peste groapa noastră
comună zice Miklós Șșșt zic morții să nu le speriem

Și ne uităm cum inimile alunecă pe deasupra
ca niște pești de lumină Fir întins strigă unul mai de la

margine Bă ce prost ești le-ai speriat urlă vecinul lui
Ba nu s-au speriat boule Câteva inimi au coborât și mai

aproape Morții freamătă ca orfanii la o vizită de înfiere
O aud zice Miklós e Fanni a ta Inima ta ca un somon

de lumină coboară printre morți și începe să înoate
înspre mine  

– – – – – – – – – –

Dragostea mea când carnea mea se topea & se îmbiba
în carnețelul din buzunar știam că niciodată nu te-am

înșelat mai oribil Numai în carnea ta mai intrasem
ca în hârtia asta Nu Invers Numai carnea ta mai intrase

atât de adânc în mine Mă îmbibam & mă așteptam ca
paginile să înceapă să cânte chiar acolo în groapa

comună Cum cânta carnea mea după ce te îmbibai în ea
Cum a cântat neîntrerupt de când te-am văzut în stația de

tramvai de lângă Keleti & până când glonțul mi-a intrat
în ceafă aici la Abda lângă Győr N-ai să mă crezi când

o să-ți spun că și glonțul străbătând creierul îmbibat de
tine a început să cânte Dar toată groapa comună poate

depune mărturie că așa a fost Așa că-i un mic scandal
că paginile n-au cântat aici jos printre oase Cântecul

ne-ar fi făcut să uităm că nu mai aveam carne Cum ne
făcea înainte să uităm că avem carne La vreo 2 luni după 

ce m-ai scos din groapă erai deja înapoi la Budapesta pe
strada Pozsony în patul nostru Ai scos carnetul din care

mă evaporasem & l-ai pus lângă tine în pat & l-ai
deschis A început să cânte ca o cutiuță muzicală Ai

rămas întinsă & l-ai ascultat atentă cântând neîntrerupt
de atunci din iunie 1946 până în februarie 2014 când

te-ai ridicat din pat & ai închis carnetul & ai coborât aici
lângă mine M-ai îmbrățișat & am început să ne îmbibăm

liniștiți unul în altul ca în pământ Ca în hârtie Groapa
comună a început deodată să cânte ca o cutiuță

muzicală

– – – – – – – – – –

Cum făceai Flammkuchen & te supărai pe cuptorul care
mereu îi ardea partea de jos Deși iubeai chestiile crocante

Cum îmi turnai mereu mai mult din ibricul de cafea
Deși iubeai cafeaua Cum alegeai mereu pentru mine porția

mai mare din crème brûlée Deși iubeai și asta Cum
ai tradus Aurélia a lui Nerval & te supărai pe el că s-a sinucis

înainte s-o termine Deși iubeai sinuciderile Cum încercai
să gemi cât mai puțin în orgasm Deși iubeai sexul Cum

te supărai când eu aveam orgasm pe tăcute Deși
iubeai tăcerea Cum te supărai că ești cu 3 ani mai mică

decât mine Eu sunt evident cea mai bătrână dintre noi
(Aveai dreptate Eu urma să mor la 35 tu la 102)

Toate astea iluminează orbitor groapa comună Aproape
cât iluminai tu în zilele triste groapa de sub cer

– – – – – – – – – –

Încercarea mea de a prinde lumina în fraze. Fiindcă, așa cum spune undeva Eriugena, omnia quae sunt lumina sunt.

De asta am cerut poeziei să construiască din cuvinte instrumente de captare a luminii & a frumuseții. Un dispozitiv de reglaj al cuvintelor care să facă lumina din ele să focalizeze, până când devine incandescentă. Frumusețea e grea, cum ziceau vechii greci & Yeats & Pound. Dar e singurul sens pe care-l găsesc literaturii: acela de a capta în cuvinte lumină & frumusețe. De a folosi cuvintele ca pe niște instrumente optice, nu ca pe unele sonore; ca pe niște instrumente de văzut, nu de auzit.

De asta cred într-o literatură care se vede, care strălucește pe pagină ca un joc de lumini.

– – – – – – – – – –

Știu ce te întrebi Sigur că m-au împușcat aici la Abda
lângă Győr Sigur că aici e groapa noastră comună lângă

memorial Sigur că Fanni m-a găsit aici după 2 ani & m-a
mutat în cimitirul Kerepesi din Budapesta Dar eu tot

în groapa comună din Abda am rămas Tot din groapa comună
scriu Nici nu se poate scrie de altundeva Știu ce te

întrebi Da Și tu mă citești acum tot din groapa
comună Și Starbucksul în care Vancu scrie acum despre

noi e tot din groapa comună Și pozele de azi ale
telescopului Webb sunt tot din groapa comună Oasele

noastre de aici din Abda nu-s deloc mai puțin colorate
& sexy decât pozele alea ale unui univers mort de 13

miliarde de ani Salut Mă numesc Universul și sunt o groapă
comună Salut Mă numesc Literatura și sunt o groapă

comună Salut Mă numesc Radnóti și Știm Știm strigă
oasele De la piramide la Google Photos n-am făcut decât

să ne inventăm gropi comune Deci da Așa e Lângă
poemele asta chiar stai ca lângă o groapă comună

Când le citești chiar dezgropi cu adevărat pe cineva Oasele
din ele chiar au fost vii & vor fi iar vii Dar nu te teme De

aici nu ne va putea muta nimeni Dacă ai citit poemele 
astea oasele tale & oasele noastre vor râde fericite împreună

în groapa lor Vom vedea împreună cum cineva apasă
butonul Select all pentru toate imaginile lumii Inclusiv

cele cu telescopul Webb & primele imagini ale universului
Vom vedea cum apasă apoi butonul Delete forever Vom

asculta apoi atenți Vom auzi fără prea mult efort cum oasele
tale & oasele noastre râd împreună aici în groapa comună

– – – – – – – – – –

Carolyn Forché & antologia ei din 1993, Against Forgetting: vreo 150 de poeți din secolul 20 cu poeme-mărturie despre ororile totalitare & genocidare; începe cu genocidul armean & se încheie cu războaiele din Iugoslavia.

Acolo l-am descoperit pe Rádnoti Miklos – cu carnetul în care și-a notat ultimele poeme găsit în buzunar după ce a fost deshumat din groapa comună în care-l aruncaseră naziștii. Și în care numai dragostea încăpățânată a soției lui, Fanni Gyarmati, a reușit să-l găsească. Hârtia era deja îmbibată de zemurile propriului corp descompus, au lăsat-o să se usuce la soare – și au reapărut pe ea unele dintre cele mai atroce & luminoase poeme compuse vreodată de o ființă umană.

Rádnoti notase în poemele lui marșul forțat al deținuților, execuțiile de pe acel drum dinspre minele de cupru din orașul sârb Bor înspre Ungaria (inclusiv execuția prietenului lui, violonistul Lorsi Miklós, împușcat în ceafă; “așa te vor omorî și pe tine peste câteva zile”, notase într-un vers din ultima zi a lui octombrie 1944; exact așa a fost – l-au împușcat și pe el în ceafă peste câteva zile), amintirile cu Fanni (iluminate orbitor – epifanii în sensul cel mai tare, strict sacru, al termenului).

Fanni a trăit încă 70 de ani, până în februarie 2014. Nu s-a mai căsătorit. După moartea ei a apărut un jurnal de 1.300 de pagini, acoperind anii 1935-46, despre care nu vorbise nimănui în cei 70 de ani. A făcut și jurnalul ăsta să apară din neant – cum făcuse și poezia să se întoarcă din mormânt. Ea e eroina absolută a acestui poem, a combinației ăsteia de nekya & kaddish.

În hârtia poemelor lui Rádnoti, îmbibată de carnea & creierul & inima lui, se îmbibase de fapt tot umanul.

(Numai când hârtia se îmbibă de corpul tău se cheamă că scrii cu adevărat.)

 

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