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Ciudad de México, Distrito Federal, Mexico

Sunday, January 17

Tómas Guðmundsson - Svefnlaus nótt (Icelandic to English translation)

In this poem, the author, being a huge admirer of the work of Jónas Hallgrímsson (one of the greatest Icelandic poets, author of  a poem called Andvökusálmur, Hymn to Insomnia), depicts one of the many topics that haunted Hallgrímsson during his battles with depression, skammdegispunglyndi, or "middle winter depression", a specifically Icelandic phenomenon. I will translate Hallgrímsson's poem later on, although it's been already translated in this book, p. 233: https://books.google.com.mx/books?id=B04_pgi-HTcC

Sleepless night

Like in the autumn when I was seventeen
and the sky was in reach and the street seemed endless
dark and light weren't at all antithetical
rather than beginning and end
so is now midday at middnight
and dreams come without notice
life has no affiliation with the dead
for the future is light and dark
faces are no longer indistinguishable and the woman with the scar
has become a girl again
the bar has opened again and there can only
members enter
be then my travel companion
to the homeland again you who were and always will be
and not be
then let's wake up
from sleepless nights

ORIGINAL TEXT

Einsog um haustið þegar ég varð sautján
og himininn var í seilingarfjarlægð og gatan virtist endalaus
myrkur og ljós voru ekki andstæður
frekar en byrjun og endir
þannig er nú hádagur um miðja nótt
og draumar koma án fyrirvara
lífið er ekki í neinum tengslum við dauða
því framundan er ljós og myrkur
andlitin eru ekki lengur sviplaus og konan með klettabeltið
er orðin að stúlku á ný
barinn hefur opnað aftur og þangað inn fá aðeins
meðlimir að koma
vertu mér svo samferða
til heimalandsins á ný þú sem varst og verður til
og ekki til
síðan vöknum við
af svefnlausum nóttum