Deux poèmes écrits par Zarganar en prison dans les années 90.


Extrait de « This prison where I live » the PEN Anthology of Imprisoned Writers’. Siobhan Daud (ed.). London, Cassell. 1996. ISBN 0-304-33306-9 (paperback). Traducteur anonyme. Veuillez citer cette édition si vous utilisez ces poèmes.

MY BLOOD OATH - Zarganar

With row upon row of iron bars
they can cage me ;

with the heat of seven suns
they can roast me ;

with a battalion of ogres
they can guard me.

But if I took my scarlet blood
and sprayed it all across the sky,
the bars would melt,
the ogres kneel,
their suns kowtow before me.

OBLIVION - Zarganar

At night the moonbeams snap.
The stars are suffocated.
That malign, unhappy barn owl
screeches out its grief.
The old train on the tracks
hurtles to its destruction,
wheezing out its last breath.
And I ? I send my thoughts beyond these walls
day in, day out, from dawn to night
(from dawn to night, day in day out).
I dream the endless daydream,
dream the endless journey
through the night, fretting,
champing at the bit :

the one I call for does not come,
the one I wait for never appears
Ah, if only I could stop the
thinking, seeing, hearing, dreaming ...
I wouldn’t feel a thing.

Poème écrit par Zarganar en prison en 2010

Untitled

It’s lucky my forehead is flat

Since my arm must often rest there.

Beneath it shines a light I must invite

From a moon I cannot see

In Myitkyina.

Zargana, Myitkyina Jail, 2010

Poème illustré par Htein Lin, ex-prisonnier birman et artiste peintre et plasticien qui expose un peu partout dans le monde. Htein Lin - qui a connu Zarganar en prison - vit maintenant à Londres. Il continue de faire activement campagne en faveur de la libération des prisonniers politiques du Myanmar.

* Article sur Htein Lin dans " The Independant" (Anglais-pdf)