From Heart to Heart: A Poetic Anatomy of Resilience
Experience emotion as raw bodily sensation. This poem dives into the physical heart's defiant fight against decay, translated to capture every visceral beat. A unique artistic exploration
From heart to heart
Your moniker now: ‘The Outrage’
in deference to the detritivores.
A pity you presaged the
miasmas of gangrene.
Here, all things thrive.
The barren atrium is performance
born of a hitched
beat.
It’s not a failure, but a gasp,
a halt to gulp in
more life to spend
in a single blow.
The knack is, like a knotted
fist, to beat, bereft of pity.
The pain dissolves in the
coursing humors,
it pares the crests
and flushes the cavas
to foist you on the chaff
with a knot in your guts.
Yes, an outright thrashing.
And your flaccid myocardium
is frail against
my violent beat.
From Heart to Heart - A Poetic Anatomy of Resilience”
“I proudly present ‘From Heart to Heart,’ a work that transcends mere translation, emerging from a profound journey of linguistic analysis and poetic interpretation that unveiled layers of meaning, rhythm, and sonority. This poem, which refuses to be a simple exchange of affections, is, in its essence, a brutal confrontation and a vehement declaration of the unwavering will to live, even when faced with the encroaching shadow of decay.
The translation from Brazilian Portuguese of ‘De coração para Coração” involved a meticulous dive into my ‘artistic calligraphy’ – a poetic language that finds its deepest truth in the physiological and bodily reactions of the self. Driven by my neurodivergent perception, which experiences and expresses emotions primarily through analyzing bodily sensations, the poem unfolds a narrative where the heart is not merely an abstract symbol of emotion, but an emotion materialized, and, therefore, clinically dissectible. Each verse is a visceral manifestation, transforming every pause (hitched beat, gasp) into an act of accumulating strength for liberation (gulp in life, single blow), reflecting involuntary bodily reactions and poetic sublimation.
The translation into English was a meticulous process of refinement that went beyond the literal. A unique aspect of this translation project was the dialogue conducted with an AI. We dissected idioms, navigated between everyday vocabulary, the precise medical/clinical lexicon (flaccid myocardium, miasmas of gangrene, coursing humors), and the elegance of literary language (moniker, bereft of pity, thrashing). We explored numerous variations and literal translations, seeking the percussive sonority and clinically violent precision that permeate the original, while honoring the authenticity of my poetic voice. ‘The Outrage’ is not merely an accusation; it is the title bestowed upon those who prey on fragility, likening them to ‘detritivores’ that feed on what has failed. This deliberate choice of ‘moniker’ in the line ‘Your moniker now: “The Outrage”’ – translating the original Portuguese ‘Tua alcunha agora é Cúmulo’ – serves to highlight a critical distinction: while detritivores are essential, noble participants in nature’s cycle of decomposition and renewal, ‘The Outrage’ refers to an entity whose actions fall beneath even this natural order. It is a supernatural and diminished being that doesn’t deserve a proper name, for its degradation transcends the natural cycle, fitting only an imposed, contemptuous label—a ‘moniker.’
This iterative process of translation with AI collaboration allowed for an unprecedented level of contextualization I provided, ensuring that personal nuances, artistic intent, and specific cultural inflections were meticulously integrated, ultimately leading to the most fitting and resonant version. It is crucial to emphasize that this author-AI partnership is not intended to devalue the invaluable work of human translators, but rather to propose an additional challenge to myself: to enhance the learning of the English language within academic and literary spheres, as well as in the everyday use of idiomatic expressions like ‘skip a beat,’ which served as the initial impetus for writing the poem in Portuguese, years ago.
The accompanying image is a visual echo of this intricate journey, presenting the body as both a battlefield and a miracle. The heart, central and exposed, pulsates with an energy that defies morbidity. And here lies a surprising contrast: despite the rawness and intensity of the poem that led to the prompt for a digital illustration, the vibrant and exuberant color palette in the artwork originates from a previous work for a children’s story. This unexpected fusion of colors injects a magical glow and a subversive delicacy into the surrealism and expressionism of the image, transforming the struggle into a visually rich celebration.
Through this multifaceted work, I invite you, dear reader, to a poetic experience to be felt in the skin, in the rhythm of one’s own heart – a celebration of life that refuses to be silenced, painted with the colors of resilience and boundless imagination