One of the things I love about the Artful Dodge is that we don’t discriminate between the many literary genres that have continued to exist. Since our very first issue, published way back in the late 70s, the Dodge has welcomed artists who create not just the traditional poetry and prose, but graphics (and not just limited to oil and water paintings) as well as letters, interviews, and diverse bodies of translation. The following poem, for example, was published in Artful Dodge 28/29 (year 1995) as part of our regular feature section called “Poets as Translators.”
For Jamal Juma’a
Finally. . .
if you sit on top of the earth’s sphere
happily dangling your feet, flayed from roving,
ready to write poems,
remember there is someone who wishes
to make a seat out of your head
and to dangle his scaly feet on your chest
in order to muffle the first wails of poetry(Written by Sa’adi Yousef. Translated from the Arabic by Khaled Mattawa.)
At Artful Dodge, our mission is simple: to print works that carry with them a strong sense of place. If they do, we’re not fussy about labels or genres. To find out more about the kind of submissions we are most excited about, visit our guidelines page on this blog or go to our official website, artfuldodge.sites.wooster.edu. And to read more awesome writings published in the Dodge, follow this link!
Happy reading,
Ananya Shrestha
Asst. Editor