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Joshua Daniel Edwin translating Dagmara Kraus

click here for the German text

click here for the Translator’s Note

guns in under-burn, time watched her slash sleek dreams.
time leeched her guns ⋅ under dreams was knit: slash, burn.

she: sugar bell, sheets in rain. mums drawn under the deck.
ere darker guns bunch, the saltless minders whine ⋅ unarmed,

i watch her run under sleet—guns, ass and brims held meek.
drams leeched her time. snug under ashen blurs was knit:

un-wince, mr. denier. gun at arms, she held the ark. un-bless’d.
rain hangs ⋅ under trees, she kills. dew. mud. machete burns.


Joshua Daniel Edwin studied poetry and literary translation at Columbia University. His poetry haunts the internet courtesy of The Adirondack Review, Avatar Review, and Feathertale. His translations of Dagmara Kraus were awarded a PEN Translation Fund grant in 2012. He is a member of the editorial board for the magazine Circumference: Poetry in Translation, which you can visit at circumferencemag.com.

Dagmara Kraus, born in 1981 in Wroclaw, Poland, has studied Comparative Literature and Art History, and currently studies creative writing at the Deutsches Literaturinstitut. Her poetry has appeared in publications such as Jahrbuch der Lyrik, freie radikale lyrik, Edit, and Neue Rundschau. She recently published her debut poetry collection, kummerang (kookbooks, Berlin).