Þóra Jónsdóttir

From Þóra Jónsdóttir

When I entered the world my parents lived at Bessastaðir. A few years later, needing more land, they sold it and bought the farm Laxamýri in Suður Þingeyjarsýsla in north Iceland, where I was brought up. There is plenty of land there and the nearest farms cannot be seen with the naked eye. A lot of labour was needed on the farm, so there were generally many people in the household. One of the main travel routes skirted the fields, and the way people used to travel before the days of mechanical transport meant we had frequent guests and visitors. In fact I think people had not changed in the way they went about certain things at that time since Iceland was settled.

Compulsory schooling was nominally from the age of 10 to 14 for six months in winter. We shared an itinerant teacher with another district. He spent three months alternately in each place, staying on the farms, but the distances involved and other  considerations meant that most children were only taught for one month each winter. The rest had to be home study with parental instruction. In the spring we took a standard examination, if I remember correctly.

Although nature is harsh up in the north, for me it was an inexhaustible source of diversity and beauty. The seasons were distinguished by different traditional farm work. There was always plenty to do. In some way that I cannot explain, each aspect of nature and the environment struck a correspondence within me and to some extent compensated for the lack of social variety in my life. Those enchantments have remained with me ever since.

In my childhood and youth I read what there was to be had, but had very limited access to any library. Because of this I also read all the poetry I could find. It was as if poetry unfolded in front of me, making me feel I could read so much between the lines. In the end I developed a great inclination towards reading poetry.

In my teens I went to the secondary school at Laugar in Reykjadalur and later completed my education at Akureyri Grammar School. Those schools were the first places where I stayed with people of my own age. I got married at an early age, and that marriage has lasted. When our children had grown up I felt that time was slow to pass and I began writing what I call poems but are perhaps short stories or memoirs. I have been equally involved in visual art, which has a great appeal for me.

Þóra Jónsdóttir, 2001.

Translated by Bernard Scudder.

Lines In a Palm: The Works of Þóra Jónsdóttir

In the poem “Nafnið” (“Name”) in Far eftir hugsun (A Trace from a Thought) (2000) it says: “Mér var gefið nafn / aftur úr grárri forneskju / kennt við heiðinn guð / grimmt eins og mannfórn / eða spjótsoddar” (“I was given a name / from ancient time / referring to a pagan god / cruel like a human sacrifice / or the tips of spears”) and later: “Hvað á barnið að heita / Í höfuðið á ömmu á Höskuldsstöðum / auðvitað” (“What name will you give the child / After her grandmother in Höskuldsstaðir of course”).

While this poem can hardly be called an attempt at a self-portrait, this reflection on a name contains certain threads often found in Þóra’s poetry, that is, the relationship with the past and family.

Þóra Jónsdóttir has published eight books of poetry and a selection of her poems appeared in a collection of poetry by three women, Ljósar Hendur: Þrjár íslenskar skáldkonur á fagnaðarfundi (Fair Hands: Three Icelandic Poetesses having a Celebration) (1996). Her first book appeared in 1973, Leit að tjaldstæði (Searching for a Campsite), and the newest is the one already referred to, from 2000. Þóra’s poems are usually highly symbolic and compact, akin to modernism while following the trends of the years. In her sixth book, Línur í lófa (Lines in a Palm) (1991), Þóra takes a different course and publishes a book of poetry considerably different from her former and latter books. The book is a kind of memoirs in the form of poetry and functions almost like a key to the poetess’s oeuvre, giving the reader a new view of many of the poetry in her other collections.

The poems describe a young girls life on a secluded farm and the first poem, which is a kind of a introduction to the book, starts like this: “Börnin mín / þið sem eruð fullvaxta og horfin frá mér / Ég læt hugann reika / til þess tíma er við áttum saman” (“My children / you who are grown up and gone away from me / I allow my thoughts to wander / to the time we had together”). The children are thirsty for knowledge and sometimes the mother buys their compliance by promising to tell them “allt í heimi” (“everything in the world”), however, often this promise is broken. “Nú vil ég segja eitthvað af því / sem ég lofaði þá en gerði ekki / því annað virtist brýnna / Ég legg nú af stað eftir óljósri slóð / minnug þess að þúsund mílna ferð / hefst í einu skrefi” (“Now I wish to say something of what / I promised then but did not do / for other things seemed more important / I will now take off following an indistinct path / keeping in mind that a journey of one thousand miles / starts with a single step”). The poems then go on to describe, in this plain fashion, the daily life on a farm. The house and its interiors are described in the poems “Bankað uppá að vestan” (“Someone is knocking on the door to the west”) (“Á bænum okkar eru tvennar útidyr” (“Our house has two main doors”) and “Við eldavélina” (“By the cooker”) (“Nei engin mynd er til af eldhúsi bernsku minnar” (“No, there is no picture available of my childhood’s kitchen”). The way various things are done is described in the poems “Undir olíulampanum” (“Under the oil-lamp”) (“Hvert okkar heldur á dúnvisk í höndunum / að fíntína fjaðrir og kusk” (“Each of us holds a whisk of eiderdown in our hands / closely combing it for feathers and grit”), “Um sláttinn” (“About the Mowing”) (“Veðrað heyskaparliðið hefur suðu fyrir eyrum og sér aðeins flekki bak við augnalokin” (“The ears of the weather-beaten mowers are singing and they can only see flecks behind their eyelids”) and “Fossadagar” (“Waterfall-days”) (“Það má teljast afrek að standa votur upp að höndum / í kaldri straumþungri ánni mikinn hluta úr degi / að skorða grindur og kistur með grjóti” (“It can be called a feat to stand soaking up to your hands / in the strong current of a cold river much of the day / securing partitions and chests with rocks”). Reading books and studying gets its share in poems like “Farskóli” (“The Travelling School”) (“Kennarinn reynir að fella kennsluna að aldri hvers og eins / agavandamál eru engin / Börnunum finnst íðilgaman í tímum og utan þeirra” (“The teacher tries to adapt the teaching to each students age / disciplinary problems are none / The children find enjoyment in classes and outside of them”) and “Þekkingarleit” (“Search for Knowledge”) (“Bókakostur heimilisins rúmast í tveimur hillum / sem ná frá lofti til gólfs” (“The home library fits into two bookshelves / reaching from floor to ceiling”).

The poems of the book can be divided into two kinds, on the one hand there are unadorned and plain descriptions of conditions and places, those are in a kind of narrative style, often characterised by a recitation and thus reminiscent of rhymes or mantras. These poems are usually expressed from some distance, even though the narrator is more often than not a participant in the events. In one of the poem the poetess describes herself in the third person as a teenage girl sitting by a churn: “Telpunni er órótt og telur víst að svona strokkur / hafi verið notaður frá landnámstíð / Það er eins og ekkert nýtt hafi skeð / síðustu þúsund árin / Hún er sjálf líkt og lokuð inni í tímanum / Hún horfir út um gluggann á hvítan snjóinn / eins og til að eyja undankomuleið” (“The girl is uneasy and is sure this kind of a churn / has been in use since the settlement period / It is like nothing new has happened / over the last thousand years / She is herself seemingly closed within time / She looks out the window at the white snow / as if to search for an escape route”).

This poem illustrates clearly the double-edged attitude towards the nostalgia, even though the poetess longs for this time which she has herself drawn in plain and rather beautified style, the memories also carry this periods longing for something else. The poetess is very conscious about this conflict as apparent from a rather amusing image of a shopping trip in the poem “Erindisleysur” (“Non-errands” (Lesnætur (Nights of Reading) 1995) where the narrator crosses the street on a non-errand, however “með sitthvað að yfirvarpi” (“with some subterfuge”). She looks at a window display and is crossing the street looking for a purpose: “Þótt ég geti sagt mér sjálf / að sé hann á annað borð til / býr hann mín megin götunnar” (“Even though I can tell myself / that if it exists at all / it resides on my side of the street”). In between the narrative poems of Línur í lófa there are more personal poems, the poetess’s reflections on the events and places she describes. Following on the poem by the churn is the poem “Í tímanum” (“In Time”) starting like this: “Ég leita hennar sem óttast / að lokast inni í tímanum” (“I am looking for her who so feared / to be shut inside of time”), and following upon the poem “Um sláttinn”, with a finale where horses bolt and are calmed by a young mower, comes the poem “Hestar tímans” (“The Horses of Time”): “Hver fær stöðvað hesta tímans” (“Who can stop the horses of time”).

This book contains themes that appear again and again in Þóra’s poetry, the relationship with nature, the folklore, the family, and separation and yearning. The journey is the motif that frames the book, as it does other books by Þóra, such as Leiðin heim (The Road Home (Also called The Road North) 1975) and the first book, Leit að tjaldstæði, is also characterised by poems about journeys.

Nature is close to Þóra’s heart and appears in many forms in her poetry. In the poem “Eins manns tjald” (“One man’s tent”) in Far eftir hugsun nature becomes a metaphor for poetry:

Mitt albesta ljóð
verður ögrum skorið
Þar gætir sjávarfalla
því særinn er hvergi langt undan

Mitt besta ljóð
ber keim af brennisteini
úr heitum baðstofuhver
er sprettur upp í bóli fólks
sem ræður illspáa drauma sína
á betri veg

Mitt besta ljóð
hripar undir hraun
birtist fjögurra gráðu lind
við hlið á eins manns tjaldi

Mitt besta ljóð
er blásin torfa á auðum sandi
og aðskilur landsfjórðuna

Ég horfði eitt sinn á eldana
renna hratt niður hlíðar Heklu
Land á frjósömum aldri
verður ljóð mitt

(My very best poem
will be sublimely rugged
There will be tides
for the ocean is never far away

My best poem
will taste of sulphur
from a hot indoor spring
erupting in people’s beds
who decipher their dreams of bad omens
in an optimistic way

My best poem
leaks under the lava
appears in a four degrees stream
beside a one man’s tent

My best poem
is the wind beaten turf on a desolate sand
separating the four parts of the country

I once looked at the fires
running fast down the sides of Hekla
Land at a fertile age
will be my poem)

The poem is reminiscent of Steinunn Sigurðardóttir’s poem “Sjálfsmyndir á sýningu” (“Self-portraits on an Exhibition”) and shows well how Þóra’s poetry is continually in a discourse with the literary landscape, while she herself remains nearly invisible in it. A similar metaphor of a poem and nature appears in the poem “Hvarvetna” (“Everywhere”) (Á hvítri verönd (On a White Veranda) 1988), where the poetess fears that the poem will desert her: “því sjávarföll þess / stjórnast ekki af tungli / og geimfar þess svífur / milli himins og jarðar” (“for its tides / are not controlled by moonlight / and its spaceship glides / between the sky and the earth”). And in “Landslagi” (“Landscape”) (Leit að tjaldstæði) the river runs through the narrator’s mind, “og fjallið / færir sig úr stað / og verður mitt.” (“and the mountain / moves / and becomes mine.”) The heath awaits her and then the lava reveals the secret to her. In the poem “Saga” (“Story”) (Höfðalag við Hraðbraut (The Head of the Bed Towards the Highway) 1983) the poetess creates a classical image of the opposition between city and nature, giving it a new spin in the words “hlið við hlið stóðu húsin / höfðalagsmegin við rúmin / stóð hraðbrautin” (“side by side stood the houses / on the side of the heads of the beds / stood the highway”). “Án skyggnis til fjalla / eigra ég um / eins og húsbóndalaus” (“Without a view to the mountains / I wander around / as without a master”) it says in the poem “Esjan” (Lesnætur), but in that poem we have already gleaned the wonderfully warm idea that “Í góðu skyggni / flytur fjallið inn til mín / Leggur hendur á axlir mér / og hefur mig fyrir gæludýr” (“When the visibility is good / the mountain moves in with me / Lays hands on my sholders / and I become its pet”). The poem “Seiður” (“Shamanism”) (Horft í birtuna (Looking into the light) 1978)) links to themes together, nature and folktale:

Sértu einn af þeim
sem unir bezt
undir berum himni

fjallabláminn fær á þig

niður vatna syngur
þér í eyrum

þú finnur til frændsemi
við grjót

þá máttu vita
að vættir landsins
hafa hér um vélt

(If you are one of those
who feels happy
under a naked sky

the blue of the mountains moves you

the hum of waters sings
in your ears

you feel kin
to rocks

then you may know
that the spirits of the country
have cast their spell)

This is one of Þóra’s more happy poems, but generally her poetry reclines more towards mournful emotions, though not without lighter tones. Many of the folklore poems are dark and eerie, such as “Þjóðsaga” (“Folk Tale”) (Leit að tjaldstæði) where the shepherd has to meet with the monster on the shore, his dog escaping. The dog is not much use either in the poem “Heimsókn” (“A Visit”) (Leit að tjaldstæði):

Hver er sá
sem kominn er
og stendur að hurðarbaki.

Göngustafur komumanns
hallast upp að dyrastaf

hurðin er í hálfa gátt.
Hundurinn er hættur gelti
og fýsir ekki út.

Snúi gestur þessi frá
skýt ég loku fyrir dyrnar
og geri á þær krossmark.

(Who is this
who has come
standing behind the door

The visitors staff
leans against the doorpost

the door is half open
The dog has stopped barking
and does not wish to go outside.

If this guest goes back again
I will bolt the door
making the sign of the cross.)

Some of the folklore poems are somewhat more joyful, as for example “Nykurvatn” (“The Lake of the Nykur” (Nykur is like a horse, but with his hooves turning the wrong way, it lives in water)) from the same book, where “fólk sem framhjá ekur” (“people driving past”) will be surprised to “að sjá nykurinn” (“see the nykur”) and in “Fljótstúni” the narrator pitches her tent in the evening to wake up in the morning in a farm populated by elves “sem þar hefur búið / mann fram af manni,  //  frá landnámstíð.” (“who have lived there / generation after generation,  //  ever since the settlement.”) These poems illustrate an enjoyable way of imagining the (sometimes evil) spirits of the country as a part of a daily reality and this approach to the folklore also appears clearly in the poems in Línur í lófa, where the tale of the barn-ghost it told, nobody fears him “þó hann gangi sjálfsagt enn í dag bæjarhlöð” (“even though he still probably walks around the farm”). A female ghost from the marsh (skotta) is wished a better existence: “mættirðu leggja upp á ný / á rósaleppuðum sauðskinnsskóm” (“may you start off again / in all new handbroidered sheep leather shoes”), and the brothers meet the sea-monster on the beach in the poem “Um sækýr og fleira” (“About sea-cows and other”), possibly it is related to the one appearing in the poems in Leit að tjaldstæði. The poem “Sumarhús um vetur” (“Sommerhouse during the Winter”) (Far eftir hugsun) is also characterised by this close encounters, where the summerhouse is left to the shadows and the desolation of the autumn. “Kannski rata þangað vofur” (“Maybe ghosts will find their way to it”), “Eða huldufólk heldur þar / nýársfagnað að hætti álfa” (“Or elves will hold their / new-years-party in the fashion of fairies”) and “þegar geimskip lendir / í grenndinni / verða eftir fáséð för / á jörðinni” (“when a spaceship lands / in the neighbourhood / there will be rare tracks left / in the earth”).

The poem “Dagtröll” (“Day trolls”) (Á hvítri verönd) appears as if in defiance of this relaxed coexistence of man and (evil) spirits. Here the folk tale appears to us as outdated and treacherous:

Tröll eru fámenn
og stórvaxin stétt
taka sjaldan til máls

Við nemum ekki tíðnina
þegar tröll kallast á

Ég hélt mig eitt sinn heyra Esjuna
bjóða öðru fjalli góðan dag
eftir andvökunótt í björtu

Þá opnaði ég rásina
svo ég yrði aftur
eins og við hin

(Trolls are a class
of the few and the large
seldom speaking

We do not hear the frequency
when trolls calling each other

I once thought I heard the Esja-mountain
saying good day to another mountain
after a sleepless night in the light

Then I opened the channel
so I would again
become like us others)

A similar fear of invasion appears in the poem “Þunnir veggir” (“Thin Walls”) (Far eftir hugsun), accompanied by the quote “... aldrei áttu óvættina að nefna” (“... never mention the name of the monster”):

Ég reis um nótt
fann ókunnuga
í híbýlum mínum
Húsið var læst
Hvernig komust þið inn
Veggirnir eru þunnir
var svarið
sem bergmálar inn í vökuna

Öðru sinni
hringdi bjallan í myrkri
Óttaslegin gerði ég krossmark
Að morgni sáust spor
í snjónum
er ég hirði ekki um að lýsa

Loks slæddist inn um lúguna
sending
Ég veit ekki enn
hvernig henni verður
komið fyrir

(I rose during the night
finding strangers
in my dwellings
The house was locked
How did you get in
The walls are thin
was the answer
echoing into the wakefulness

Another time
the bell rang in darkness
Fearful I made the mark of the cross
In the morning there were traces
in the snow
which I shall not bother to describe

Finally a ghost was slipped
through the hatch
I still do not know
how to
get rid of it)

Both these poems are a good example of the symbolism of Þóra’s poetry where the imagery of the folk tale is used to describe a feeling of isolation and exclusion in “Dagtröll”, with a distinct undertone of madness which is also evident in “Þunnum veggjum”, only there it is the need for isolation and the fear of siege that is expressed by the folk-tale.

In the poem “Systur” (“Sisters”) (Höfðalag við hraðbraut) we see an image equally derived from legends and folk tales. The poet describes sisters who are very close, together they have an egg of life and they do not bother “að greina sundur mynd vora / í sléttum fleti vatnsins” (“to separate their conjoined image / in the still surface of the water”). Eventually their paths diverge and “Munum vér systur ná / að mætast framar við vatnið / varpa á milli oss fjöregginu á ný / að mynd vor renni saman í fletinum.” (“Will we sisters manage / to meet again by the lake / throw our egg of life between us again / melding our image together on the surface again.”) On the one hand this is a reference to the myriad of eggs of life owned by trolls and spirits populating fairy tales and folk tales, and on the other a theme from the Greek legend of the three sisters sharing one eye can be discerned. The picture accompanying the poem shows three longhaired girls, it is by Þóra who sometimes illustrates her books. Apart from the folk lore reference the poem contains another of Þóra’s recurrent themes, the family, and also the mournful yearning and separation which is so often apparent in the poems.

The family theme appears again and again in poetry about siblings and children. The poems in Línur í lófa describe more often the interaction between the siblings than relationship with the parents, and as already indicated the book is portrayed as a kind of a narrative or mantra for the poetess’s children, whom she often addresses in her poems. In the poem “Morgunsól” (“Morning Sun”) (Horft í birtuna) a new mother is described, she wakes while others sleep and is unable to look “af andliti barnsins nýfædda.” (“away from the face of the newborn”) The poem “Langt að komið” (“From far Away”) in the same book describes how even the mother’s love cannot provide an unconditional right of ownership:

Þegar barnið fæddist
leit móðirin í augu þess
og sá
að það var langt að komið

Hún lagði það við brjóst
að hún mætti eignast það.

Seinna leit hún í augu þess
og sá
að það var langt að komið

og ekki mögulegt
að eignast það.

(When the child was born
the mother looked into its eyes
and saw
that it had come from far away

She lay it at her breast
so it would be hers.

Later she looked into its eyes
and saw
that it had come from far away

and that is was impossible
to own it.)

The first part of the book Á hvítri verönd is called “Mömmuleikir” (“Playing Mom”) and contains poems about mothers and children and reflections on motherhood. As Silja Aðalsteinsdóttir points out in her review in the newspaper Þjóðviljinn in 1989 the poem “Sleginn vefur” (“Weaving”) describes the gap between the generations and offers up a hope that the daughter will have more freedom in her life then the mother who “fæst við að vefa ábreiðu” (“is weaving a cover”) but can hardly detect anymore “glitvefsins hefðbundnu áttablaðarós” (“the traditional brocade eight-leaved-rose”). She doubts she will manage to finish the work but intends to leave it to her daughter “og gefa henni frjálsar hendur” (“giving her free rein”).

This is one of Þóra’s poems which particularly addresses gender roles and the position of women, but this has been a common theme in the poetry of women for the past three decades. Þóra is, as already pointed out, almost invisible in Icelandic literary history, even though she has been a prolific writer from the beginning. As is often the case among women writers she started publishing her poetry late in her life and garnered some attention for her first book of poetry, Leit að tjaldstæði, generally receiving favourable reviews. Her other books also received good reviews but despite these favourable reception the poetess does not seem to have manage to take up the place within the literary landscape she so rightly deserves. Partly this can be explained through feminist theory: it is a fact that women writers have found it more difficult to be heard in the male-centered literary society and that their works have not received similar attention to the writings of men, despite the equal quality of the work. This argument is perhaps not completely applicable to Þóra’s poetry, at least not in the light of what has been assumed to be the main reason for the muting of women poets, that their poetry has to much to do with housekeeping and the everyday. Þóra certainly writes about the traditional women’s issues such as motherhood, everyday life in the home, and uses themes from folk lore, often assumed to characterise the poetry of women. However, her books are also rich in impressive nature poetry and challenging existential questions (such as in the theme of the journey) also considered to characterize the poetry of men. It can be inferred that Þóra’s isolation from the literary canon is partly due to her position (which is actually also a part of her gender role), as she is a upper-middle class housewife who does not bear much resemblance to the ‘risky’ life supposedly associated with the lifestyle of artists and poets. Apart from this she has not been outspoken about poetry, neither her own or others, and as such not been active or visible in the discourse on literature – not as a ‘poet’ nor a ‘poetess’. She says in an interview in Morgunblaðið from April 26th 1986 that she finds it unfulfilling to be in the shadow and that she needs encouragement and response to her books from readers and critics. And she names the position of poetesses in this context, pointing out how they are still boycotted.

It is apparent from some of the poems that the position of women is something that concerns her. This is perhaps most clearly seen in the poem “Engin mynd” (“No Picture”) (Lesnætur), about the grandmother and the fact that no picture of her exists:

Hún dó úr tæringu í baðstofu
frá manni og ungum börnum
mælti svo fyrir að ljóð sín yrðu brennd
Engin ljósmynd er til af henni
að eigin ákvörðun
Hún var talin skilningsgóð
á fagurfræðilega hluti
Hryggir trúðu henni fyrir sorgum

Aldrei átti amma þín eldspýtur
að kveikja upp í hlóðunum, sagði hann
staddur í nýja eldhúsinu mínu

Ég get ekki vitað hvernig kona hún var
enda þótt ég beri nafn hennar
Eitt sinn dreymdi mig mynd hennar á vegg
Geisli féll á hana skáhallt
skipti andlitinu í tvennt
Ekkert sást utan hvít rákin
Það segir mér: Hún er ekki mynd
Hún er ljósrák og leyndarmál

(She died from consumption in the sitting-room
from her husband and young children
stipulating that her poetry should be burned
No photograph exists of her
by her own decision
She was considered understanding
of beautiful things
The sad confided her sorrows to her

Your grandmother never had matchsticks
to light up the stove, he said
standing in my new kitchen

I cannot know what kind of a woman she was
even though I carry her name
Once I dreamt I saw her picture on a wall
A beam of light struck it from askew
separating the face in two
Nothing was seen apart from the white stripe
This tells me: She is not a picture
She is a beam of light and a mystery)

This is the grandmother the poetess is named after, and she turns out to have been a poetess herself, there is no picture of her and she lives in the poetess mind as a beam of light and a mystery. The poem also illustrates the strong feeling of yearning and separation so characteristic of Þóra’s poetry, from the poem describing nostalgia to the family poems describing the unavoidable separation between siblings, parents and children, friends and loved ones. This separation is described by the poetess in her plain style in the poem “Samfylgd” (“Companionship”) (Leiðin heim): “Samfylgdin / hvarf úr augsýn.  //  Við gættum þess ekki / að bar á milli / í hverju spori.” (“The companionship / disappeared.  //  We did not watch / that each step / separated us more.”) The poem is reminiscent of Steinn Steinarr’s poem about the road, as in fact are more of Þóra’s poems. However, her take on these motifs is always her own. And the poem continues: “Tekst að sveigja gönguna / og nálgast handan hæðanna.  //  Hversu er ferðin löng, / unz við látum allt af hendi / fyrir spölkorns fylgd.” (“Manage to swerve / and approach on the other side of the hills.  //  How long is the journey, / ’till we willingly part with everything / for a short guidance.”

Þóra pursues this motif of the journey and uses it in a classic way to symbolise various existential issues characteristic of the modernist poetry. Leit að tjaldstæði is full of journey-poems and more often than not these journeys are rather precarious. In “Blindvegur” (“A Blind Road”) the narrator stays “við enda þessa vegar / sem ekki liggur til baka” (“at the end of this road / which does not lead back”). “Þrotlaus er leiðin / til landsins sem ekki finnst” (“The way is tireless / to the country that can not be found”) it says in “Fjarskinn er blár” (“The Distance is Blue”) and in “Gegnið í hrauni” (“Walking in the Lava field”) there is also a road that does not lead back:

Frá því snemma í morgun
hef ég gengið í hrauninu.

Lengi dags
hugðist ég finna hreiður gæsarinnar
í næstu gjótu.

Margt hefur borið fyrir augu
og dagurinn hrokkið skammt
í hrauninu.

Mér lízt
að ekki sé allt sem sýnist
og skil ekki lengur
hvað mér gekk til.

Sárfætt óska ég þess eins
að snúa heim.

Svartur skuggi fylgir fast á hæla mér.

Ég stend á bakka árinnar
á leið minni.

Þar hefur brúna tekið af.

(Since early this morning
I have been walking in the lava field

For much of the day
I intended to find the nest of the goose
in the next hollow.

Many things have I seen
and the day has been too short
in the lava field.

I think
that not everything is as it seems
and can no longer understand
what my purpose was.

With sore feet I only wish
to return home.

A black shadow is following me closely.

I am standing at the riverbank
on my way.

The bridge has been swept away.)

The imagery is modernistic, chiseled and strong. The journey starts with a search for the goose nest which could be a symbol of adventures or a new life – as in the fairytale of mother goose – and the narrator is immersing herself in her surroundings, experiencing them anew, and the day goes fast. But soon it appears that there is something not right about this journey and doubt settles in, perhaps because the narrator cannot shake her past off. Finally she is standing by a new borderline, which turns out to be uncrossable. The journey will not last longer this time. Leiðin heim is, as indicated by the name, full of poetry about journeys who are somewhat more optimistic than those in Leit að tjaldstæði, “Að rata” (“To Find Ones Way”) is a rather traditional reflection on being lost and roads that are continually changing and ends such: “Nú heyrist mér vindurinn hvísla: Þeir rata er sjá fyrir sér áfangastaðinn.” (“Now I hear the wind whispering: They find their way who can visualise their destination.”) A known destination is also the aim in the poem “Ferðabæn” (“A Prayer for Travelling”), this time using the modern imagery of car traffic. “Yfir heiðina” (“Over the Heath”) uses the imagery of the past describing a coach ride through the snow: “Á að grafa farþegana í fönn / eða hvað?” (“Are the passengers to be buried in the snow / or what?”). Still the destination is in sight: “Þess verður freistað / að ná sæluhúsinu.” (“An attempt will be made / to reach the rest house.”) And despite the difficulties in the journey-poems of the first book the poetess believes the urge for travels to be important, as apparent from the poem “Dagsverkið” in Höfðalag við hraðbraut, where the narrator hesitates as the days fill the years. In “Næturferð” (“A Night Journey”) the narrator comes home from a night journey back in time and dwells for a while in a no-man’s-land for even snow covers the ground when she wakes up. And then the day invites her “að stíga / ný spor í fönnina” (“to make / new steps in the snow”) and start a new journey. Then the journeys become more precarious again in the later books. “Erindisleysur” describes a pointless wandering looking for a purpose, and the journey-poems in Far eftir hugsun are almost surreal in their disorder, without testifying to the sharp angst found in Leit að tjaldstæði. The poem “Í fjárhúsi” (“In the Sheepcote”) is a good example of this; here the journey has become a dreamlike idea:

Ég beið þess að fiskbúð opnaði
hinkraði í fjárhúsi
Þrifalegt var um að litast
uppbúin rúm í garðanum
Þar hurfu mér skórnir
Ég kom við í áföstu eldhúsi
Kona vildi gefa mér kaffi
vissi ekki um skóna
Ég spurði hver svæfi í fjárhúsinu
Börn auðmanna ansaði hún.
Að endingu fann ég stakan skó.

(I waited for the fishmonger to open
lingering in a sheepcote
It looked clean
beds were made in the hey
There I lost my shoes
I came by an attached kitchen
A woman offered me coffee
did not know about the shoes
I asked who slept in the sheepcote
The children of the wealthy she answered
Finally I found a single shoe.)

In the poem “Um tæpan veg” (“On a Negligible Road”) a blind man is in the driver’s seat. A woman sits in the car trying to guide him and notices that he can see through a finger: “Þau héldu áfram ferðinni / hugðust kaupa altaristöflu” (“They continued their journey / intending to by an altar piece”). A car drives without a driver through the streets in the twilight of the city in the poem “Rauður” (“Red”). The narrator follows carefully seeing that “þetta er ekki bifreið / heldur rauður tarfur / sem tekur á rás / út í buskann” (“this is not a car / but a red bull / sprinting / into the distant”). The poem is accompanied by the quote “allt er dautt sem ekki er rautt” (“all is dead which is not red”).

And it does indeed become apparent in the poem “Svæfilvísa” (“A Pillow Verse”) (with the quotation: “Renni renni rekkja mín hvert sem maður vill” (“Run run my bed wherever one wishes”)) that dreams and journeys are closely related phenomenon:

Við vegginn ljósa
þar sem vaggan stendur
er vært að hvíla
hjúfra að svæfli
huga að mynd við gaflinn
af bát sem báran aldrei haggar
og ekki siglir burt

Sæfararnir
haldnir heimþrá
geta ekki gengið á vatni
Í nótt munu þúsund stjörnur
horfa inn um gluggann
hreinan eftir regn

Far draumanna
dregur upp festar
og siglir sinn sjó

(By the fair wall
where the cradle stands
it is soothing to rest
snuggling in the pillow
peering at a picture by the side
showing a boat never moved by the wave
and does not sail away

The seamen
full of homesickness
can not walk on water
Tonight a thousand stars
will watch through the window
clean after the rain

The trace of the dreams
will draw its anchor
and sail away)

úlfhildur dagsdóttir

Articles

Soffía Auður Birgisdóttir: “I mit sind kogte vreden: Om Vilborg Dagbjartsdóttir, Þóra Jónsdóttir og Þuríður Guðmundsdóttir”
På jorden 1960-1990, Nordisk kvinndelitteraturhistorie, bind iv, ritstj. Elisabeth Møller Jensen og fl. København, Rosinante 1997, s. 113-116

See also: Neijmann, Daisy L., ed. A History of Icelandic Literature
University of Nebraska Press, 2007, pp. 489, 547