Cultural exchanges

My love of languages is in this one, but more so my love of ALL human beings.

Shumi wa DOKsho des
I like to do it when I'm stressed

Oshigoto wa KAIsha-in des
I know a jobs a job, but it isn't the best

Sitting at work,dark thoughts are not far
But here comes a customer

"Priviet, kak DELA?"
Well you know me Volonya
Nye bloHA, here's your card,

And might I say I see improvements in your arms
"Da? SpasEEba!"
pazhalaSTA moy druug

I work in an inner city gym you see
A place of small thinking,
But languages set me free

Here's Schwa-vek a polish intellect
Djen dobrey, YAKsheMESH?
"Good Sam, djen Koya, I see your mastering polish"
Not nearly close, but it's nice of Him to notice

Asim the Pakistani gent
Who swopped me a copy of the Koran
for an issue of new scientist
"Asalam a lekUUM"
Yes peace be upon you
"Samuel how many Surahs have you read?"
The prophets just got to Jawei,
I'm working through it slowly my friend
I haven't the heart to tell him I'm not of a religious bent

These are my pleasures through the long boring days
A little bit of humanity and cultural exchange

Author's Note

Translations in order of appearance
Japanese- shumi wa doksho des-my hobby is reading
O shigoto wa KAIsha in des-my job is a company worker

Russian. Priviet- hello, kak dela?- how's things, Nye bloHA- not bad
Da- yes, spaseeba- thank you

Polish. Djen dobrey-good morning/afternoon, YAKsheMESH?-how's thing?
Djen Koya-thank you

Quranic Arabic (spoken by most Muslims for greetings) asalaam a lekUUM- peace be upon you

Reviews

[Aethereal]

Mexicans have been experimenting with multilingual music, speech, and poetry for tens of years where English and Spanish merge into a single artificial language. There must be multilingual experiments gong like this on all over the globe. Languages learn from each other. English is always acquiring new words to add to its dictionary as it has been doing for hundreds of years, and so remains dominant. There are thousands of English words derived from words from other languages. A single global language is evolving.

[Samuel Jack]

That would be boring, to speak a two tongues is to have two souls, or so I've heard. But it would defiantly be beneficial to have a global language. Thanks for the well thought out feedback!

[Aethereal]

The English language has many souls as it's always sequestering terms from all the other languages, and then plugging them into its vocabulary. It shall keep expanding its vocabulary until it's the world's only language other than mathematics. English has a predatory syntax! It's the fastest evolving language on the planet.

[Magnolia Liberato]

My dad's a linguist and he speaks seven or eight different languages, so this poem was really easy for me to relate to. He always wants me to learn a new language, and I'm always hearing him talk with total strangers in their native language, so this poem kind of reminds me of walking down the street with him.
This was actually a beautiful poem. It was poetry, but it didn't have the structured, up-tight feel that I find in a lot of the other poems I read, and I can honestly say that I have never read anything like this. I can't wait to read more of your work!

[Samuel Jack]

Thank you very much, I felt it was a bit pretentious but it is one of my Hobbies, I'm no language expert though, your Dad sounds awesome.

[Jack V.]

Cool read. I like that it doesn't sound like Poetry. Things that try to sound like "poetry" kind of turn me off as a reader.

[Samuel Jack]

I started off like that, but this website community has shown me so many poetry techniques it's too tempting not to try them all out. Thanks for the review Mr Vee

[Jack V.]

Lol, you're welcome. It's Ms. V

[DCT ponderings]

Okay so I liked that you wrote it so that you showed the reader where to stress the syllables. I have a love of language myself so I took my time and went along slowly repeating the foreign lines.

I lived in Germany in a flat of 8 a long time ago and one of the most interesting things were our dinner parties. Everyone had a different tongue and just to get through dinner took a conversation chain with multiple translations all around. Like the child's game where you pass the sentences around the circle I often wonder what got ever so slightly altered.

Like Parsimony I want to know the meanings after reading it. I wouldn't add translation into the poem but perhaps as an appendix at the end.

That said I am having fun looking them up. i.e. Shumi wa= Hobby. So your hobby is Dokshu? martial arts? Since some of it is written for sound I can't quite translate it fully. And I realize a few are names, Japanese regarding you hobby, Russian about work, Polish friendly exchange etc...but now you must provide the translations for the other language lovers.

[Samuel Jack]

Thanks for the big review, doksho means reading, it's just about a day at work really, learning immigrants languages is often a foreign (get it) concept to English people. I just like to give them something back. But I get what you're saying, I like the idea of putting in translations in the notes. Danke

[Parsimony]

I'm no language expert. A novel idea nevertheless, incorporating snippets of cultural exchange w poetic prose. I found I was stumbling over the phrases I did not understand. Would help if I had some idea of what they meant.

[Samuel Jack]

Hmmm it was an interesting little experiment, I'm gonna play with it a bit, ill let you know when it's been refined