Translated from the Swedish by Paul Cunningham.
This is part of our special feature, New Nordic Voices.
The wolf is so small
The wolf is so very small
I see the wolf die
I don’t know what to do
I see that the wolf is on the ground
I see the wolf die
I stand beside the wolf
I don’t know how much blood the wolf has
But I think the wolf is dead
I don’t know if the wolf is dead
But the wolf seems to be dead
I don’t want it to be a dead wolf
But I think the wolf is dead
I don’t know what to do
I am almost nothing
I think I am very weak
I think I have very weak arms
I sit down beside the wolf
But the wolf does not move
The wolf does not move at all
It’s just there dead
It’s a dead body
I’m sitting beside a dead body
I’m sitting close to a dead body
I place my weak arms on the dead body
It is a dead body
I have my weak arms on the dead body
The body is not moving
It is a dead body
The dead body does not move at all
It’s an almost cold body
It’s an almost cold wolf
I have my weak arms on the dead body
The wolf is almost whole
I see that wolf is almost whole
But I see that the throat is not whole
I am holding the wolf by its throat
It is not a lot of throat
It is not a lot of body
It is an almost cold body
I hold on to its almost cold body
I am not holding on tightly
But I hold on to the almost cold body
The body is still
The body is quite still
The body does not move at all
I do not want the body to be cold
I do not want the body to be still
I do not want the body to be dead
I do not want the body to be quite so dead
But the body is quite dead
I do not want the body to be quite so cold
But the body is quite cold
The body is very still
I have the body close to me
It’s not a lot of throat
It’s not a lot of body
It’s a dead wolf
I do not want it to be a dead wolf
But it is a dead wolf
It is a dead body
I am holding a dead body
It is a dead body
It is a dead wolf
But I am not dead
I am not a dead body
I can be a dead body
But I am not a dead body
I am holding a dead body
I am whole
I am quite whole
I am so very whole
The wolf is not whole
But I am so very whole
I don’t know what to do
I think I am very weak
I think I am very small
I don’t know how weak I am
But I think I am very weak
I am holding a dead body
I am holding a dead body with my weak arms
I don’t know how weak my arms are
But I think my arms are very weak
I am holding a dead body with my very weak arms
It is a heavy body
It is hard to hold a heavy body
It is a lot of body
It is a cold body
I am not cold
But I’m getting cold
The dead body is cold
The dead body is heavy
I am weak
I have very weak arms
But I am holding a heavy body with my very weak arms
I hold on to the dead body
The dead body is cold
I am cold
I live
I hold on to the dead body for as long as I can
I think that it’s been a long time
I don’t know how long
But I think it’s been a long time
I lay down the dead body
I lay the dead body on the ground
The body is on the ground
I see the body
I see that the dead body is on the ground
The wolf looks very dead
I don’t want the wolf to look very dead
But the wolf looks very dead
I don’t want to look at a very dead wolf
But I am looking at a very dead wolf
I don’t know what to do
But I am hungry
I am very hungry
I want to eat
I take out the wolf’s heart
The heart is warm
The hear beats
The heart is very heavy
The heart is very red
I eat the wolf’s heart
I’m getting full
I’m getting warm
I must move
I go
I leave the wolf
The wolf is on the ground
I am not lying on the ground
I am going to the ground
The wolf is on the ground
The wolf is dead on the ground
The wolf is absolutely dead on the ground
I am not dead on the ground
I am walking on the ground
I am weak
I am not dead
I am weak
I am heavy
I am not dead
I am walking on the ground
I am full
I am heavy
I am not dead
I am walking between the trees
I go beside the trees
The trees are tall
I am small
I am heavy
I am not dead
I am walking on the ground
I see that the sky is above me
I see that the sky is dark
It hasn’t started raining yet
I’m going between the trees
There are a lot of trees
There are quite a lot of trees
I am lying between the trees
I am lying on the ground
I am small
I don’t know how small I am
But I think I am very small
I am on the ground
The trees are above me
The trees are long
The trees are very long
The sky is above me
It hasn’t started raining yet
I am whole
I am warm
The ground is not warm
But I am warm
I am weak
I am very weak
I don’t know how weak I am
But I am weak
I don’t know how weak I am
But I am very weak
The sky is dark
The sky is very dark
It hasn’t started raining yet
I’m falling asleep
Helena Österlund (b. 1978) lives in Stockholm, Sweden. She was awarded the Borås Magazine Debut Award for her 2010 collection of poems, Ordet och fägerna (Words and Colors). Inspiration for her work comes from writers such as Thomas Bernhard, Gertrude Stein, Anne Carson, and Samuel Beckett. Music also inspires her and she listens to Philip Glass, Steve Reich, and John Cage. When writing, however, she wants to listen to music that makes her want to dance, like techno and EBM.
Paul Cunningham (b. 1989) lives in Athens, Georgia. He has translated two chapbooks by Sara Tuss Efrik: Automanias: Selected Poems (Goodmorning Menagerie, 2016) and The Night’s Belly (Toad Press, 2016). Excerpts from his translation of Helena Österlund’s full-length collection Words and Colors have most recently appeared in Interim: A Journal of Poetry & Poetics, Asymptote, and Sink Review. His own original poetry has recently appeared in OmniVerse, SAND, Yalobusha Review, Fireflies, Gigantic Sequins, Bat City Review, and others. He is a Princeton University INCH scholar and he holds a M.F.A. in poetry from the University of Notre Dame.
Photo: Helena Österlund | Sara Mac Key.
Published on April 17, 2018.
