The up and down of feet by Elke Erb and translated by Rosemarie Waldrop

This is poetry from Germany.

The up and down of feet by Elke Erb translated by Rosemarie Waldrop is published by Burning Deck. This is a Book originally written in German. This was published in 2017.0 and has the ISBN of 9.78193619423E12.

The up and down of feet, by Elke Erb and translated by Rosemarie Waldrop from German, brings German poetry into English through Elke Erb’s feet, motion, and the minute registrations of everyday life becoming formally alert. 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 feet, movement, daily, and the exacting comedy of noticing how the body carries thought, 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. The up and down of feet belongs in the translated poetry library because it gives the German shelf a precise, idiosyncratic poetics of ordinary motion.

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.