In Berlin last week, I walked with friends out of the city, along where the wall used to be – where the birch trees have been growing freely for a quarter of a century. “That should make you feel right at home,…
In Berlin last week, I walked with friends out of the city, along where the wall used to be – where the birch trees have been growing freely for a quarter of a century. “That should make you feel right at home,…
If you don’t fit neatly into a particular category, if you’re difficult for people to place, they won’t place you, their eyes might slide right over you and move on to someone else. And if you try to break down those…
Leaving everything behind is not always a free choice – this isn’t the year of the hare, the open road doesn’t necessarily lead to freedom. When hunger and death drive you out of your home in the depths of winter, you might…
Today’s a day to celebrate all kinds of love, and here are some poems for it that you’ve probably never seen. Rumi’s Persian work is very well known and loved in the English-speaking world, but he also wrote in Arabic.…
Time moves in a spiral, as each birth or death is connected to the ones before it and the ones after it. The old stories and the old ways are still very much alive – change is only just about…
Sometimes – especially in January? – it’s all too much, and you just want to get away from it all. Quit the job, leave your partner and home behind, and escape. Just head north and live in the forest, from…
A Mordovian winter seems endless, especially if you are going to see seven of them in succession, and not by choice. But under the snow, a seed is knocking: This strong collection of poems from Latvian writer Knuts Skujenieks, could not be…
After three days of the new year, how are your resolutions shaping up? There’s still time to make a new one, and join the Poetry Translation Centre in translating some amazing poetry from around the world. You can join the PTC…