PAVOL
JANIK
Wisdom
Do
you want to make a hole in the world?
Too bad.
The
world is full of holes.
And
yet nothing goes through it.
Only
you became smaller.
Decreased.
Do
you hear that noise?
It
lasts and sometimes
pretends
it is a speech.
You
answer
the
questions
that
you asked.
As
many questions
that
many answers.
That
is that wisdom.
With
it you like to make a hole in the world.
Too
bad.
You
suffer only because of
what
you know.
TRANSLATED INTO ENGLISH
BY SMILJANA PIKSIADES
MÚDROSŤ
Chceš
urobiť dieru do sveta?
Škoda.
Je
tak deravo na svete.
A
predsa z neho nič neunikne.
To
len teba je čoraz menej.
Ubúda
ťa.
Počuješ
ten ruch?
Trvá
a
niekedy predstiera hovor.
Odpovedáš
mu
na
otázky,
ktoré
mu sám prisudzuješ.
Toľko
otázok
a
raz toľko odpovedí.
To
je tá múdrosť.
Ňou
chceš urobiť dieru do sveta.
Škoda.
Len
to, čo vieš,
ťa
mrzí.
Pax
Militaris
Peace
is not female emotionalisam.
Peace
is a battle.
Peace
doesn’t dwell in words.
Peace
is waiting for its opportunity
hidden
in rockets heads.
Fastest
peace.
Spreading
at supersonic speed.
Do
you want peace?
Have
it.
It
will come to you
in
a few seconds.
Permanent
and strongest peace-
-weighs
350 000 trinitrotoluens.
TRANSLATED INTO ENGLISH
BY SMILJANA PIKSIADES
PAX
MILITARIS
Mier
nie je ženské rojčenie.
Mier
je boj.
Mier
neprebýva v slovách.
Mier
čaká na svoju príležitosť
utajený
v raketových hlaviciach.
Najrýchlejší
mier.
Šíriaci
sa nadzvukovou rýchlosťou.
Chcete
mier?
Majte
si ho.
O
niekoľko sekúnd
vás
zasiahne.
Trvalý
a najsilnejší mier –
-
mier o sile 350 000 ton trinitrotoluénu.
Tribute
With
a move of arm
you
break the sky.
Your
admirers, to death to you devoted,
are
in extasy.
There
is so many of them,
only
archive can know them
by
the name.
And
how many more will you charm?!
You
want some more glory
to
add to your tribute,
at
least a poem,
the
deflection of loud defile.
I
am honored, my
noble
army.
TRANSLATED INTO ENGLISH
BY SMILJANA PIKSIADES
POCTA
Mávnutím
ruky
rozbíjaš
oblohu.
Ctitelia
tebe oddaní až na smrť
sú
vo vytržení.
Toľko
ctiteľov,
že
ich po mene pozná
iba
archív.
A
koľkých ešte len očaríš?!
Želáš
si ďalšiu slávnosť na svoju počesť,
aspoň
báseň,
odblesk
rinčiaceho defilé.
Je
mi cťou,
šľachetná
armáda.
We
Are Professionals
For
us is enough to insert moon into twilight,
not
routinely, like a coin into the slot machine,
and
conosours of beauty are trembling in admiration
while
choirs recite praises.
We
are closer to Zenith
of
course light as baloons.
We
sing about its monumental emptiness.
We
already envy our own past.
TRANSLATED INTO ENGLISH
BY SMILJANA PIKSIADES
SME
PROFESIONÁLI
Stačí
nám vsunúť lunu do súmraku,
nevdojak,
ako sa do automatu vkladá minca,
a
vyznávači krásy tŕpnu v úžase,
obradne
odriekajú zborový chválospev.
Stúpame
k zenitu
samozrejme
a ľahkovážne ako balón.
Spejúci
k jeho monumentálnej prázdnote.
Už
závidíme aj vlastnej povesti.
Chatter
Above The Grave
Clumsy
are hitting lamps
like
night moths.
Matured
drunks are falling down.
In
the amusement park, weird generals
in
a little green skirts are making grimaces.
In
the middle of a metropolis, the forest burns.
In
the shell of whispering lips
you
swim in a part of the story.
My
heart is beating the rest.
TRANSLATED INTO ENGLISH
BY SMILJANA PIKSIADES
TÁRANIE
NAD HROBOM
Nemehlá
vrážajú do lámp
ako
nočné motýle.
Zrelí
opilci opadávajú.
A
v lunaparku pojašení generáli
v
zelených sukienkach strúhajú grimasy.
Uprostred
veľkomesta horí les.
V
škrupinke šepkajúcich úst
plávaš
do rozprávky.
Srdce
mi odbíja celú.
PAVOL
JANIK
Mgr. art. PAVOL JANIK, PhD., (magister artis et philosophiae
doctor) was born in 1956 in Bratislava, where he also studied film and
television dramaturgy and scriptwriting at the Drama Faculty of the Academy of
Performing Arts (VSMU). He has worked at the Ministry of Culture (1983–1987),
in the media and in advertising. President of the Slovak Writers’ Society
(2003–2007), Secretary-General of the Slovak Writers’ Society (1998–2003,
2007–2013), Editor-in-Chief of the Slovak literary weekly Literarny tyzdennik
(2010–2013). Honorary Member of the Union of Czech Writers (from 2000), Member
of the Editorial Board of the weekly of the UCW Obrys-Kmen (2004–2014), Member
of the Editorial Board of the weekly of the UCW Literatura – Umeni – Kultura
(from 2014). Member of the Writers Club International (from 2004). Member of the
Poetas del Mundo (from 2015). Member of the World Poets Society (from 2016).
Director of the Writers Capital International Foundation for Slovakia and the
Czech Republic (2016–2017). Chief Representative of the World Nation Writers’
Union in Slovakia (from 2016). Ambassador of the Worldwide Peace Organization
(Organizacion Para la Paz Mundial) in Slovakia (from 2018). Member of the Board
of the International Writers Association (IWA BOGDANI) (from 2019). He has
received a number of awards for his literary and advertising work both in his
own country and abroad. This virtuoso of Slovak literature, Pavol Janik, is a
poet, dramatist, prose writer, translator, publicist and copywriter. His
literary activities focus mainly on poetry. Even his first book of poems
Unconfirmed Reports (1981) attracted the attention of the leading authorities
in Slovak literary circles. He presented himself as a plain-spoken poet with a
spontaneous manner of poetic expression and an inclination for irony directed
not only at others, but also at himself. This style has become typical of all
his work, which in spite of its critical character has also acquired a
humorous, even bizarre dimension. His manner of expression is becoming terse to
the point of being aphoristic. It is thus perfectly natural that Pavol Janik's
literary interests should come to embrace aphorisms founded on a shift of
meaning in the form of puns. In his work he is gradually raising some very
disturbing questions and pointing to serious problems concerning the further
development of humankind, while all the time widening his range of themes and
styles. Literary experts liken Janik's poetic virtuosity to that in the work of
Miroslav Valek, while in the opinion of the Russian poet, translator and
literary critic, Natalia Shvedova, Valek is more profound and Janik more
inventive. He has translated in poetic form several collections of poetry and
written works of drama with elements of the style of the Theatre of the Absurd.
Pavol Janik’s literary works have been published not only in Slovakia, but also
in Albania, Argentina, Bangladesh, Belarus, Belgium, Bosnia and Herzegovina,
Bulgaria, Canada, Chile, Croatia, the Czech Republic, France, Germany, Hungary,
India, Israel, Italy, Jordan, Kosovo, Macedonia, Mexico, Moldova, Nepal,
Pakistan, Poland, the People's Republic
of China, the Republic of China (Taiwan), Romania, the Russian Federation,
Serbia, South Korea, Spain, Syria, Turkey, Ukraine, United Kingdom, the United
States of America and Venezuela.