It’s very encouraging to be nominated for a Pushcart, but it’s a double blessing when it’s a nomination of a translation. I got word on Saturday that The Arkansas International nominated my translation of “Knee on Dirt” by Oriette D’Angelo for a Pushcart Prize. I didn’t even know that translations could be nominated, so this was a wonderful surprise for me.
My passion for translating comes from the desire to bring more exposure to important poetic voices from South America. Oriette D’Angelo is one of those essential, important voices! This Pushcart nomination provides the opportunity to shed more light on Oriette D’Angelo’s work, and for that I am incredibly grateful.
The poem “Knee on Dirt” comes from Oriette’s collection “Cardiopatías,” which I’ve translated and am in the process of finding a publisher. It derives it’s title from the directive in Spanish, “Rodilla en Tierra” which is what Chavez coerced the Venezuelans to do to show subjugation to his regime, equating submission with patriotism. Bringing the poem across from Spanish into English adds other timely dimensions to the speaker’s words and symbols.
Here’s a link to “Knee on Dirt” from The Arkansas International’s website: https://www.arkint.org/oriette-dangelo
Thank you, Arkansas International, for giving this poem a place to live, and for this meaningful honor. I’m delighted and eternally grateful.
Lupita Eyde-Tucker is a bilingual poet and translator raised in New Jersey and Guayaquil, Ecuador. She is an MFA candidate at the University of Florida, and the winner of the 2021 Unbound Book Festival Emerging Poet Award. Lupita also won the 2019 Betty Gabehart Prize, and in 2018 was selected as an AWP Writer to Writer Mentee by poet Maggie Smith. In 2020-21 her chapbook manuscript was a finalist in the Black River Chapbook Competition, Frontier Poetry's Chapbook Contest, and Gloria Anzaldúa Prize, and a runner-up for the Chad Walsh Chapbook Prize from Beloit Poetry Journal. She is currently a staff scholar at Bread Loaf Translators Conference and Bread Loaf Writers Conference, and a scholarship recipient from the 2021 New York State Summer Writers Institute.