Il faut avoir trop de temps libre pour se torturer de la façon suivante ! Los textos de este breve poema en inglés, español, francés, italiano y ruso se encuentran a continuación. The goal was to write a poem in several languages at once, adjusting all the texts so that the poem funzionasse (worked) more or less the same way in each version. For example, I began with plums, but needed a noun that was masculine singular in all languages, and so the foreigner came to instead offer the man кусок фрукта (a piece of fruit). Je promets qu’à l’avenir -por mi salud mental- I will try to restrain myself.

▲

Delicious thoughts

The foreigner
Alone also
In her thoughts
Was pleased
To be able to understand for once

When he told her that the piece of fruit
She had offered him
Was delicious
A little sour
He was thinking
In the midst of this square

Full of
Delicious thoughts

▲

Pensamientos deliciosos

La extranjera
Sola también
En sus pensamientos
Se alegró
De poder entender por una vez

Cuando le dijo que el pedacito de fruta
Que ella le había ofrecido
Era delicioso
Un poco agrio
Estaba pensando
En medio de esta plaza

Llena de
Pensamientos deliciosos

▲

Pensées délicieuses

L’étrangère
Seule aussi
Dans ses pensées
Était heureuse
De pouvoir comprendre pour une fois

Lorsqu’il disait que le morceau de fruit
Qu’elle lui avait offert
Était délicieux
Un peu acide
Il pensait
Au milieu de cette place

Pleine de
Délicieuses pensées

▲

Pensieri deliziosi

La straniera donna
Anch’essa sola
Nei suoi pensieri
Era felice
Essere in grado di capire per una volta

Quando le disse che il pezzo de frutta
Che lei gli offriva
Era delizioso
Un po’ acido
Lui pensava
In mezzo a questa piazza

Piena di
Pensieri deliziosi

▲

Вкусные мысли

Иностранка
Тоже одна
В своих мыслях
Была рада
Что смогла понять хоть раз

Когда он сказал ей, что что кусок фрукта,
Kоторый она ему предложила
Был вкусным
Немного кисловатым
Он думал
Посреди этой площади

Полной
Вкусных мыслей

— Poem (all versions) & drawings by William Eaton

∩ No surprise this: I’ve been reading William Carlos Williams. But not his most famous poems (the plums and the wheelbarrow). Other things, like The Last Words Of My English Grandmother. There are connections here, too, between these Pensées délicieuses, and my explorations based on Paul Éluard poems.

My own poem(s) began when a Japanese artist, Takako Matsuno, just before she returned to Tokyo, brought to my apartment a box of Yoku Moku cookies, which were truly delicious and quite to my taste (butter-vanilla). I sent Takako a thank-you note, but of course there are plenty of (not really) “polite” people who send such notes—“Thank you so much for the truly delicious cookies”—when they did not particularly like the cookies or have never even tried one (having instead “regifted” the box?).

So here a poem began to begin. Was there any way that I might communicate to another person—who happened to be still learning English—that I indeed really liked the cookies? I appreciated the gift not only for the “thought” but also for the contents. And further, this might be to say something larger: that Takako and I have similar tastes (as it seems that we do).

And may I add that I detest saccharine displays of kindness, politeness, friendliness, etc., and such displays seem more and more pervasive as more and more of the available jobs require a good deal of “emotional labor.” I understand the unpleasantness of being served by waiters who give the impression that—surprise, surprise—they are only providing decent service in the hopes of getting a big tip. And yet neither do I like it when I feel, rightly or wrongly, that the friendliness of a waiter—or of any other person, on the job or not—is simply canned, put on. If you can only pretend to be nice, try—if this is even possible for you—to learn not to pretend at all. And even if this means shutting up and not making any false facial expressions, etc.

From such bittersweet roots grew a poem.

And thanks to CR for help with the Italian!