Endurance

BUGS IN PRISON BY PEK-ÊNG KOA

Translator’s Note

The Taiwanese language, considered as a dialect of Chinese, had been repressed for decades until censorship in Taiwan was completely lifted and nationalism began to be challenged. Through self-education with a Taiwanese-Chinese dictionary he was given during his time in prison, Pek-êng Koa found a new purpose in his life. Bugs in Prison compares lives found in the prison, where as the author once remarked, “Sometimes the value of a prisoner is lower than that of these bugs”.

 

Bugs in Prison is an excerpt from his collection of poems “Fireflies Within The Walls” (awarded and published by the Dept. of Culture, Tainan City in 2010). Each poem consists of only three short lines. The translation is much longer, but the translator fails to condense the sentences without sacrificing the faithful representation of the atmosphere and circumstances the author created. The discrepancy arises from the author’s unique and unrepeatable style, as well as the differences between the English and Taiwanese.

C. J. Anderson-Wu

Bugs in Prison

By Pek-Êng Koa

【胡蠅】

 

撆手ńg   、屈馬步

挺挺徛踮雞尾錐頂懸

聽候千軍萬箸來拍擂台

 

 

【虼蠽】

 

兩支雷達伸出壁角裂縫

試探

鐵牆的厚度

 

 

【臭腥龜仔】

修煉三季的功力

佮犯人的靈魂

比臭

Bugs in Prison

Translated from Taiwanese by C. J. Anderson-Wu

Flies

Sleeves rolled up, squatting in horse stance

Over the chicken tail in my lunch

Ready for the advancing grand army of chopsticks

 

 

Cockroaches

A pair of antennae stretch out from a cracked corner

to test

the thickness of the iron wall

 

 

Lychee Giant Stink Bugs

For three seasons they had been training

to compete with the summer stink of

prisoner souls

  • Pek-êng Koa is an award-winning poet, a teacher and an advocate of writing poetry in the Taiwanese language. Having been convicted and incarcerated for 17 years due to two charges of robbery, Pek-êng Koa’s poetry is often about the conditions of imprisonment to express his urge of prison reform.

  • C. J. Anderson-Wu is a writer and translator from Taiwan. Her fiction and poetry focus on injustice and state violence.