Sionnain Buckley Translates Rainer Maria Rilke

Iterations on a Fragment

Fragment einer Auferstehung

Der Engel stemmt mit den Trompetenstößen
die Steine auf-, und sie, in parallelen
Entschlüssen, strecken sich nach ihren Seelen,
die Oben stehn, geordnet nach den Größen

Fragment (also: scrap, shard, splinter, remnant) [of] a resurrection (rebirth, rising, literally: on-creation/up-creation)

The angel lifts (stems, presses) with the trumpet-blasts (-blows, -bursts) the stones (rocks, pieces, pits) up-/on-/off- [with “stemmt”: prying/prize open, force open, lever up], and they/she, in parallel (simultaneous, at the same time, analogous, similar) decisions (resolutions, resolve, determination) [*very similar word to decryption, deciphering, unscrambling], stretch (lengthen, elongate, maybe: reach) [themselves, can be included in verb form for “stretch”] for (towards, after, by, over to) their souls/spirits, that/who/which above (overhead, aloft, upward, upstairs) [*noun form] stand/are, arranged (sorted, organized, ordered, put in order, disentangled, unraveled, arrayed, tabulated) after (by, according to, towards, for, past) the/their size (largeness, height, value, dimensions, volume, magnitude, heft)

Fragment on a Resurrection

Trumpet blast: & the angels pry
back the stones — in perfect unison, all
stretch themselves taut toward their souls,
hovering above, sorted according to size

Fragment (also: scrap, shard, splinter, remnant) [of] a resurrection (rebirth, rising, literally: on-creation/up-creation)

Scrap of Re-creation

Angel, with the blast of its trumpet, forces open
the rock-door. And they: in parallel purpose,
will themselves longer to reach their own souls,
there, overhead, ordered according to worth

Fragment (also: scrap, shard, splinter, remnant) [of] a resurrection (rebirth, rising, literally: on- creation/up-creation)

Remnant, a Rising

The angel with the air of its trumpet lifts
the pieces up — and they move as one, the many
reaching out toward their souls,
waiting upstairs, arrayed by height, by heft

Fragment (also: scrap, shard, splinter, remnant) [of] a resurrection (rebirth, rising, literally: on-creation/up-creation)

Shard. A Rebirth.

Breath of the far-world plays across the stones.
Opens them. And they all make the same
decision. Stretch out for the souls they held.
Floating in the open now. Sorted by size.

Fragment (also: scrap, shard, splinter, remnant) [of] a resurrection (rebirth, rising, literally: on-creation/up-creation)

Fragment of a Resurrection

Voice of the universe trumpets away
the stones —, and they all, at once, know
what to do, know to raise themselves to meet
their risen souls, waiting, there, where they go

Translator’s Note

Translation is a process of erasure. The work of translation necessitates a choosing of certain linguistic and semantic paths over others, picking a route from source language to target language and erasing the other possibilities. Some translators are aiming for this effect—to make the translation feel so “natural” in the target language that a reader doesn’t register any latent or suppressed or erased alternate possibilities. But there are other translators who attempt to highlight or acknowledge the presence of those possibilities in the text, by refusing to make the text “behave” in the target language, by letting the difficulty, the impossibility, of perfect or natural translation vibrate across the page and the reader’s mind.

These vibrations, these possibilities, are most legible in the middle material of the translator: the trots and the rough drafts born from them. The trot, a literal word-by-word or phrase-by-phrase translation, can help the translator get a basic sense of the shape and movement of a text, even while it may not yet be legible structurally or idiomatically in the target language. This kind of middle material is used most often by translators who don’t have a native or fluent knowledge of the source text, but may also be used by translators more generally as a first pass tool, which can then be modified and adapted to capture the poetry, lyricism, and shades of meaning that aren’t apparent in a literal translation.

As a non-native German speaker—and truly, a student of German language when I began translating Rilke—I was aware always [immer: forever, constantly, at all times, the whole time] of the possibilities of the text, of ones I could read and make sense of, and ones I was certainly missing without a much deeper understanding of the language. My trots then, were matrices of possibility, often acknowledging patterns, multiplicities, versions, idioms, questions, reminders, incompatibilities, and unknowns, as I encountered them in the text. They were and are alive things, creatures [Kreatur: creation, critter, wretch] writhing with an overflow of words, too many to capture in any one poem. I have a soft spot for these hybrid intermediate texts, Frankenstein’s monsters hidden from the light, unfit for reading the way the finished translation purports to be.

This kind of trot is immensely rich, overflowing [strömen: streaming, gushing, spilling over] with linguistic opportunity, with semantic too-muchness. “Iterations on a Fragment” is my attempt to play inside that rich space, to see what a version of Rilke’s poem, and a version of translation itself, might look like when it more explicitly names the fullness, the many-ness of the interstice between source language and target language. Where else can that fullness send me? What other routes can I take towards meaning? What conversations can Rilke and I continue to have in the open [Freie: open space, outside, beyond] between our languages, our times, and our worlds?

Rainer Maria Rilke (1875–1926) was an Austrian poet and novelist. He is considered one of the most significant figures in German literature, and one of the most important poets of the 20th century. He is best known for his major works, the Duino Elegies and the Sonnets to Orpheus, as well as his posthumously published collection of correspondence, Letters to a Young Poet.

Sionnain Buckley is a writer, translator, and visual artist based in Massachusetts. Her work has appeared in DIAGRAM, Poet Lore, Wigleaf, and others, and was selected for Best Spiritual Literature 2024. Her translations of Rainer Maria Rilke have appeared in Hayden’s Ferry Review and Samovar. She holds an MFA in fiction from The Ohio State University, and has received fellowship support for her work from the Oak Spring Garden Foundation, the Kimmel Harding Nelson Center for the Arts, and the Adirondack Center for Writing. More of her work can be found at sionnainbuckley.com.