Engulf–enkindle by Anja Utler and translated by Kurt Beals

This is poetry from Germany.

Engulf–enkindle by Anja Utler translated by Kurt Beals is published by Burning Deck/Anyart. This is a Book originally written in German. This was published in 2010.0 and has the ISBN of 9.781936194032E12.

Engulf–enkindle, by Anja Utler and translated by Kurt Beals from German, brings German poetry into English through Anja Utler’s burning syntax, bodily intensity, and the double motion of being engulfed and set alight. The metadata gives the reader a doorway, but the real value is what happens once the poem begins making its own weather. I would read it for fire, body, syntax, and the feeling of language catching before meaning has settled, not as a fixed lesson about a nation, period, or school. The best entry point is still the poem itself: the line that catches, the image that refuses to explain itself, the feeling that arrives before paraphrase. Engulf–enkindle belongs in the translated poetry library because it adds a fierce experimental German voice where form and sensation cannot be separated.

If you’d like to see international poetry continue and gain traction, consider requesting this work from your local library, or purchasing it from places like Open Books (a poetry only bookstore), Asterism Books (an independent press distributor), or bookshop.org to connect you with your local bookstores.

Check out more of the always in-progress translated poetry index here.