boarding the plane jeg forstår
the hubbub of the language
not yet quite familiar
my Polish falters
hvad hedder det?
what’s that?
the glottal stop the in-drawn ja
and the mental nod
of partial recognition
shift an accent
by one notch
and another
language nudges
itself into
the intonation
of this flight
Note:
An early version of this poem, called ‘Riga – Copenhagen,’ was published as part of my essay ‘Three Languages and Three Trees: Not So False Friends’ by David and Helen Constantine in Modern Poetry in Translation (3rd series, no.16; 2011) 155-158.
Elżbieta Wójcik-Leese
Elżbieta Wójcik-Leese writes with/in English, Polish and Danish. Her multilingual texts have appeared, among others, in Wretched Strangers: Borders, Movement, Homes, Other Countries: Contemporary Poets Rewiring History, Metropoetica. Poetry and Urban Space: Women Writing Cities and such journals as Cordite Poetry Review, Long Poem Magazine, Modern Poetry in Translation, Poetry Salzburg Review, Shearsman and Tears in the Fence. Nothing More (Arc, 2013), sampling Krystyna Miłobędzka, was shortlisted for the 2015 Popescu European Poetry Translation Prize. Night Truck Driver (Zephyr Press, 2020), her selection from Marcin Świetlicki, was longlisted for the 2021 PEN Award for Poetry in Translation. Cognitive Poetic Readings in Elizabeth Bishop: Portrait of a Mind Thinking (2010) is based on her research as a Fulbright scholar at the Elizabeth Bishop archives. She co-curates ‘Transreading’ courses on transnational and hybrid poetries for the Poetry School in London. IG: @elzbietawojcikleese
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