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Rita Ann Higgins

Our Brother the Pope

  • 1 Ask the Concierge | Translations: de
  • 2 Edict | Translations: de
  • 3 He Knows No Artichokes | Translations: de
  • 4 The Immortals | Translations: de
  • 5 Ireland is changing Mother
  • 6 Light of the Moon
  • 7 Our Brother the Pope | Translations: ru
  • 8 Some People | Translations: de
  • 9 The Did-You-Come-Yets of the Western World | Translations: de
  • 10 Woman's Inhumanity to Woman | Translations: de
Language: english
Translations: russian (Наш брат Папа Римский)
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Our Brother the Pope

   Sorrow is better than laughter,
        for by a sad countenance the heart is made better.

                                            ECCLESIASTES


Few people know this
but Pope John the 23rd
was a member of our family.
His real name was
Pope John the 23rd Higgins.

He lived with us in Ballybrit,
I can't say he had his own room
but he didn't need it;
he had his own house,
our house.

He was there
when our father
brought home the mackerel,
when Yahweh Curran
whistled his way
round the twelve cottages.

He was there when we
painted the house
for the races
and when we
got the new range
Stanley the 9th.

When he died
nothing was the same.
The mackerel began to stink,
Yahweh Curran didn't whistle
for a solid month,
the picture show in Silk's Shed
was just a runaway wagon
with three wheels.

Our mother cried and cried.
Saint Jude and Saint Agnes
let her down big time,
as for poor Philomena,
she couldn't conjure up

a minor miracle if her life depended on it,
she was gone by the board.

The neighbours who were well clued in
queued up round the cottages
to offer their condolence,
they were soaking in grief.

We're sorry about the mackerel
they said one after the other,
holding their noses.
Our mother cried louder.

© Bloodaxe Books Ltd
From: Throw in the Vowels
Northumberland: Bloodaxe Books Ltd, 2005
ISBN: 1852247002
Audio production: 2008 Literaturwerkstatt Berlin

Translations:

Language: russian

Наш брат Папа Римский

          Горести лучше, чем смех,
                 ибо печаль умягчает сердце.
                                 Экклезиаст


Немногие знали, что
Папа Иоанн XXIII являлся
членом нашей семьи.
Его настоящее имя было
Папа Иоанн XXIII Хиггинс.

Он жил с нами в Баллибрите.
Я даже не могу сказать, что у него
была отдельная комната,
но она ему была не нужна:
в его распоряжении был весь дом.
Наш дом.

Он был дома,
когда отец принес домой
макрель,
и когда Ягве Курран
насвистывал, обходя
все двенадцать окрестных коттеджей.

Он был дома, когда мы
красили наш дом
по случаю ежегодных
конских бегов,
и когда мы купили
новую кухонную плиту
«Стэнли» девятой модели.

Когда он умер,
все пошло вкривь и вкось.
Макрель провоняла,
Ягве Курран перестал свистеть
на целый месяц,
кинотеатр в Шелковом Сарае
стал похож на фургон переселенца
с отвалившимся колесом.

Наша мать все плакала и плакала.
Святой Джуд и Святая Агнесса
по-настоящему ее подвели,
что же до Филомены,
та не могла сотворить и
крошечного чуда, даже если
ее жизнь зависела бы от этого.
О ней вообще можно было забыть.

Хорошо осведомленные соседи
стояли в очереди перед нашим коттеджем,
чтоб выразить соболезнования.
Их глаза сочились печалью.

«Как жаль, что такое случилось с макрелью!» —
говорил каждый из них,
зажимая нос.
Мать плакала громче.

Перевел на русский язык Анатолий Кудрявицкий

Впервые опубликовано в журнале «Дети Ра» № 3(17), 2006
First published in Deti Ra magazine, No 3 (17), 2006
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Rita Ann Higgins

* 26.05.1955, Galway, Ireland
lives in: Galway, Ireland

Rita Ann Higgins, born in Galway in 1955, has published numerous volumes of poetry, as well as several plays. One of 11 children, Higgins left school at 14 and first began to be interested in writing during a long stay in hospital in her 20s.

In an interview she described her decision to become a poet with a typical lack of pretension: 'You didn’t have to worry about tenses and verbs. You could write a poem without a verb, and if you didn’t know what a verb was – and I didn’t – it was ok.' Her poems, similarly ironic in tone, have been awarded numerous prizes.

Higgins has held the post of Writer-in-Residence at several Irish Universities, undertaken readings at Oxford, Queens, and Yale University - where her poems are also part of the Literature Curriculum - and at conferences in Germany, Austria, Hungary, Belgium and Israel. Her poems have been translated into Hebrew, German, Italian, Dutch, French and Swedish.

Publications
  • Goddess on the Mervue Bus

    County Clare: Salmon Poetry, 1986

  • Witch in the Bushes

    County Clare: Salmon Poetry, 1988

  • Goddess and Witch

    County Clare: Salmon Poetry, 1990

  • Face Licker Come Home

    [Play / Theaterstück]

    First produced: Punchbag Theatre, Galway

    Salmon Publishing, 1991

  • Philomena's Revenge

    County Clare: Salmon Poetry, 1992

  • God of the Hatch Man

    [Play / Theaterstück]

    First produced: Taibhdhearc na Gallimhe, Republic of ireland

    Unpublished, 1993

  • Higher Purchase

    County Clare: Salmon Poetry, 1996

  • Sunny Side Plucked: New and Selected Poems

    Northumberland: Bloodaxe Books Ltd, 1996

  • Throw in the Vowels: Selected Poems

    Northumberland: Bloodaxe Books Ltd, 2005

Links
  • Rita Ann Higgins' Official Website

    Website (en)

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