Re: Poetry Translation Challenge

Gary Shannon wrote:

>Just for fun: Translate this poem to your favorite
>conlang:
>
>  -- elokuno animata --
>
>ami i anke e atelu
>ami i anlu e asoli
>aki isi anikoto u ami
>alami ikanto anofi ami
>uwe ate ipo ikila?
>
>The poem is in Larry Sulky's Elomi and a dictionary
>can
>be found here: http://fiziwig.com/lexicon.html
>
>The form of the poem is called elokuno, or greater
>eloku,
>and is similar to Haiku, but since elomi words are
>longer,
>it has 5 lines with 9, 9, 11, 11, and 9 syllables.
>
>Use whatever poetic form is best for your own conlang
>translation.
I've finally achieved to translate it into Vbazi. I remember my grammar but
I cannot remember most of the morphemes so it has been long.

But I did it!

(remembering: |q|=/N/, |y|=/E/, plosive+|h|=plosive+aspiration, |'|
indicates that the following consonant is sylabic)


Elokunog njele

didnabiizi ai phyqiizi
balnajaliizi ai kazneheliizi
gilyi zaltj'l vi de zgykebi
gilyi hiwbj'l gyn de gleqebi
dzeidevgiv'lnyle liw'l?


So it makes 8, 11, 9, 10, 8... which is not very beautiful.

But I can solve this.

If I replace "-balnaja-" which means the moon in its larger sense by
"-bvalna-" which means "full moon" and that I cut the final e in "-kaznehe-"
that means sun, and if I contract the "de" dynamic marker on the verb it
modifies I can get it to 8, 9, 8, 9, 8 which is better.

(Since the apostrophe already has a meaning, I think I will use the hyphen
to indicate contractions of two words, but I still hesitate among the
hyphen, the coma, the colon, the quotation mark, and "x".)

This would be like this:

Elokunog njele

didnabiizi ai phyqiizi
bvalnaliizi ai kaznehiizi
gilyi zaltj'l vi d-zgykebi
gilyi hiwbj'l gyn d-gleqebi
dzeidevgiv'lnyle liw'l?


Here is the interlinear:

didnab – iiz      - i           ai   phyq   – iiz  – i
sky      identity   1st.sng.    &    ground   i.c.   1.S.
          copula

bvalnal   – iiz  - i      ai   kazneh         – iiz  – i
full moon   i.c.   1.S.   &    (from kaznehe)   i.c.   1.S.
                                sun

gi – lyi    zalt - j'l   vi    d         – zgyk     – eb          – i
my   sng.   work   acc.  day   (from de)   watch/     3.S.
transitive
                                dynamic     look at    (agrees       suffix
                                marker                 with work)

gi - lyi    hiwb    - j'l    gyn     d    - gleq – eb  – i
my   sng.   joy/fun   acc.   night   d.m.   sing   3.S   t.s.

dzei     – dev              - giv'lnyl   - e     (l)                    - i
  - w'l?
question   (from de+ve)       understand   2.S   (because “i” follows
1.S   dat.
marker     d.m.+can(prefix)                      a word ending in vowel
                                                  l is inserted)


This was a fun exercise to do. I should do it more often to practice in
Vbazi.

- Max