Rats | Tikus-tikus

By and | 4 November 2012
Rats


Rats stop me in my path

The rats now hoisting a flag

              and looking cynically my way

The rats embracing a flagpole

legs planted stiffly on the garbage bin

The flag, of indeterminate colors

flutters in the night

Which way the wind blows is uncertain

The rats that cross my path and the gutter

fly their flag high, as high as a minaret

              as high as a church steeple

              as high as a temple’s peak.

Whose national flag is it anyway

              that flutters in the night.

Field rats, kitchen rats, gutter rats, garbage rats

tree rats, rice rats, city rats,

stand in formation at the flagpole’s base

paying respect to the night rats

on their memorial day.


The rats that bar my way as I go home

              together carrying the multi-colored flag

Laugh giddily to see me stop in my tracks.




Tikus-tikus


Tikus-tikus memotong jalanku

Tikus-tikus yang yang mengangkat bendera

              Dan melirik sinis ke arahku

Tikus-tikus yang memeluk tiang

Tegar kakinya menopang di tong sampah

Bendera itu, tak jelas warnanya

Berkibar tengah malam

Tak jelas ke arah mana angin bertiup

Tikus-tikus yang memotong jalan dan parit

Mengibar benderanya, setinggi menara masjid

              Setinggi toreng gereja

              Setinggi puncak kuil dan pura.

Bendera kebangsaan siapa sebenarnya,

              Berkibar di tengah malam itu.

Tikus tanah, tikus dapur, tikus parit, tikus-tikus tong sampah

Tikus pohon, tikus sawah, tikus-tikus kota,

Berbaris di kaki bendera

Memberi hormat

Hari agung tikus-tikus tengah malam.


Tikus-tikus yang menghadang langkahku pulang

              Menggotong bendera warna-warni

Tertawa gembira melihat langkahku yang terhenti.


GGB, Sawangan 12/08/97




English translation by John H. McGlynn
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Nama lengkapnya Fredie Johnie Waromi. Lahir di Hollandia/Jayapura, 06 Agustus 1960. Pendidikan terakhirnya, Fakultas Hukum Universitas Cendrawasih, Papua(Tidak selesai). Pernah belajar di Bengkel Teater Rendra sejak 1987 hingga 2001. Karya-karyanya belum diterbitkan sebagai buku, namun ia telah menyiapkan dalam bentuk manuskrip, seperti: Sulur-Sulur Sali, Kumpulan Puisi, dan yang akan segera terbit adalah Anggadi Tupa, sebuah fabel Papua. John Waromi telah sering diundang ke berbagai festival sastra nasional maupun internasional, di antaranya: Ubud Writers and Readers Festival 2006 sebagai peserta dan pada 2008 kembali diundang sebagai peninjau. Ia juga diundang ke Northen Territory Writers Festival 2008, sebagai penulis tamu di Writer's Journey Workshop, Back Stage Bali 2011, membacakan puisi dan mengadakan temu wicara pada Forum Penyair Internasinal Indonesia, Surabaya 2012. Saat ini John Waromi masih aktif menulis dan menjadi aktivis Lingkungan di Papua.
John Waromi (Fredie Johnie Waromi) was born in Jayapura, Papua, on 6 August 1960. He studied with Rendra’s theatre workshop (Bengkel Teater Rendra) between 1987 and 2001. He is regularly invited to participate in national and international lieterature festivals like the Ubud Writers and Readers Festival (2006 and 2008), the Northern Territory Writers Festival (2008), and as a guest writer at the Writer's Journey Workshop, Back Stage Bali (2011). He recently read poetry and gave a speech at the International Writer’s Forum in Surabaya (2012). His manuscript Anggadi Tupa, a Papauan fable, is in press. He is currently writing and participating in environmental activism in Papua.

More by Johnnie Waromi on Cordite Poetry Review →
John H. McGlynn, a graduate of the University of Michigan Ann Arbor (1981), lives in Jakarta where, in 1987, he established the Lontar Foundation, the only organization in the world devoted to the publication of Indonesian literature in translation. Through Lontar, he has overseen the publication of more than one hundred books on Indonesian literature and culture. Also through Lontar, he has produced twenty-four films on Indonesian writers and more than thirty films on Indonesian performance traditions. John is the Indonesian country editor for Manoa, a literary journal published by the University of Hawaii and for Words Without Borders, a virtual literary journal. He is a member of the International Commission of the Indonesian Publishers Association (IKAPI), PEN International-New York and the Association of Asian Studies. He is also a trustee of AMINEF, the American Indonesian Exchange Foundation, which oversees the Fulbright and Humphrey scholarship programs in Indonesia.

http://www.lontar.org/

More by John H. McGlynn on Cordite Poetry Review →

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