Centocartography: Budapest

By | 4 February 2025

Street map of area in Budapest


i.
In the shape of the Budapest street map, a poem that reads: "the whole world may end up may end up may end up as a vast void only in my eyes grief dissolves across the chill blank darknesses of space"
Sándor Petőfi, ‘Man’ (trans. Miklós Nádasdi); Attila József, ‘Grief’ (trans. Vernon Watkins); Árpád Tóth, ‘From Soul To Soul’ (trans. Watson Kirkconnell)


ii.
In the shape of the Budapest street map, a poem that reads: “pick some leaves some leaves some leaves from any tree with axes and hoes and stones would come relentless sickles, golden guillotines”
Sándor Petőfi, ‘I Dreamed Something Beautiful’ (trans. Miklós Nádasdi); Attila József, ‘At Last’ (trans. John Székely); Árpád Tóth, ‘The Pendulum’ (trans. Watson Kirkconnell)


iii.
In the shape of the Budapest street map, a poem that reads: “we wish to advance but we can really? But can we really? But can we really? Father on, like a cloistered graveyard to paint with blood the sunset’s opulence”
Sándor Petőfi, ‘To The Parliament’ (trans. Miklós Nádasdi); Attila József, ‘Night On The Outskirts’ (trans. Michael Hamburger); Árpád Tóth, ‘I, God’s Broken Cello, Shall Be Silent’ (trans. Leslie A. Kery)


iv.
In the shape of the Budapest street map, a poem that reads: “but see how the winter-world lowers and lowers and lowers and lowers and lowers and lowers I train stillness to my heart to feel your gentle body’s murmuring”
Sándor Petőfi, ‘September Ends’ (trans. Zsuzsanna Ozsváth & Frederick Turner); Attila József, ‘Ode’ (trans. Miklós Nádasdi); Árpád Tóth, ‘Evening Song’ (trans. Zsuzsanna Ozsváth & Frederick Turner)


v.
In the shape of the Budapest street map, a poem that reads: “one thought bother me night and day night and day night and day my limbs are dragging, pulling me to your as blood wakes veins whose paths are closed and numb”
Sándor Petőfi, ‘One Thought Bothers Me’ (trans. Miklós Nádasdi); Attila József, ‘You Made A Child Of Me’ (trans. Miklós Nádasdi); Árpád Tóth, ‘Evening Gloriole’ (trans. Zsuzsanna Ozsváth & Frederick Turner)

 


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Dave Drayton was an amateur banjo player, Vice President of the Australian Sweat Bathing Association, and a founding member of the Atterton Academy. He received his PhD from the University of Technology, Sydney, and in 2014 was awarded the William Blake Prize for Poetry.

More by Dave Drayton on Cordite Poetry Review →

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