Translations from the Mother Tongue

Translator's Note I have been translating my mother's language for forty years—first as a child, interpreting her Tamil for English-speaking teachers and shopkeepers; then as a scholar, rendering classical poetry into forms American readers might recognize; and finally as a poet, trying to capture the flavor of her idiom in my own work. None of these translations have been adequate.

None have conveyed what is lost when she says *kadavul* and I write "god," when she speaks of *kaadhal* and I settle for "love."