PETER PORTER

Peter Neville Frederick Porter OAM (16 February 1929 – 23 April 2010) was a British-based Australian poet.

Porter was born in Brisbane, Australia, in 1929. His mother, Marion, died of a burst gall-bladder in 1938. He was educated at the Anglican Church Grammar School (then known as the Church of England Grammar School) and left school at eighteen to work as a trainee journalist at The Courier-Mail. However, he only lasted a year with the paper before he was dismissed.[2] He emigrated to England in 1951. On the boat he met the future novelist Jill Neville. Porter was portrayed in Neville's first book, The Fall Girl (1966). After two suicide attempts, he returned to Brisbane. Ten months later he was back in England. In 1955 he began attending meetings of "The Group". It was his association with "The Group" that allowed him to publish his first collection in 1961.

He married in 1961 and had two daughters (born in 1962 and 1965). Porter's wife, Shirley Jannice Henry, committed suicide in 1974 and was found dead in her parents' house in Marlow, Buckinghamshire. In 1991 Porter married Christine Berg, a child psychologist. In 2001, he was named Poet in Residence at the Royal Albert Hall. In 2004 he was a candidate for the position of Professor of Poetry at Oxford University. In 2007, he was made a Royal Society of Literature Companion of Literature, an honour bestowed on a maximum of ten living writers.

Porter died on 23 April 2010, aged 81, after suffering from liver cancer for a year. After news of Porter's death in 2010, the Australian Book Review announced it would rename its ABR Poetry Prize the Peter Porter Poetry Prize in honour of Porter.

Porter was born in Brisbane, Australia, in 1929. His mother, Marion, died of a burst gall-bladder in 1938. He was educated at the Anglican Church Grammar School (then known as the Church of England Grammar School) and left school at eighteen to work as a trainee journalist at The Courier-Mail. However, he only lasted a year with the paper before he was dismissed.  He emigrated to England in 1951. On the boat he met the future novelist Jill Neville. Porter was portrayed in Neville's first book, The Fall Girl (1966). After two suicide attempts, he returned to Brisbane. Ten months later he was back in England. In 1955 he began attending meetings of "The Group". It was his association with "The Group" that allowed him to publish his first collection in 1961.

He married in 1961 and had two daughters (born in 1962 and 1965). Porter's wife, Shirley Jannice Henry, committed suicide in 1974 and was found dead in her parents' house in Marlow, Buckinghamshire. In 1991 Porter married Christine Berg, a child psychologist. In 2001, he was named Poet in Residence at the Royal Albert Hall. In 2004 he was a candidate for the position of Professor of Poetry at Oxford University. In 2007, he was made a Royal Society of Literature Companion of Literature, an honour bestowed on a maximum of ten living writers.

Porter died on 23 April 2010, aged 81, after suffering from liver cancer for a year. After news of Porter's death in 2010, the Australian Book Review announced it would rename its ABR Poetry Prize the Peter Porter Poetry Prize in honour of Porter.
Fonte da biografia: wikipedia

POESIA SEMPRE  - Ano 6 – Número 9  - Rio de Janeiro - Março 1998. Fundação BIBLIOTECA NACIONAL – Departamento Nacional do Livro -  Ministério da Cultura.  Editor Geral: Antonio Carlos Secchin.  Ex. bibl. Antonio Miranda

Your Attention Please

The Polar DEW has just warned that
          A nuclear rocket strike of
          At least one thousand megatons
          Has been launched by the enemy
          Directly at our major cities.

This announcement will take

Two and a quarter minutes to make,

You therefore have a further

Eight and a quarter minutes

To comply with the shelter

Requirements published in the Civil

Defence Code — section Atomic Attack.

A specially shortened Mass

Will be broadcast at the end

Of this announcement —

Protestant and Jewish services
          Will begin simultaneously —

Select your wavelength immediately
          According to instructions
          In the Defence Code.
          Do not Take well-loved pets (including birds)
          Into your shelter — they will consume
          Fresh air. Leave the old and bed —
          ridden, you can do nothing for them.
          Remember to press the sealing
          Switch when everyone is in
          The shelter. Set the radiation
          Aerial, turn on the geiger barometer.
          Turn off your Television now.

Turn off your radio immediately
          The Services end. At the same time
          Secure explosion plugs in the ears
          Of each member of your family.
          Take Down your plasma flasks. Give your children
          The pills marked one and two
          In the C.D. green container, then put

Them to bed. Do not break
          The inside airlock seals until
          The radiation All Clear shows
          (Watch for the cuckoo in your
          perspex panel), or your District
          Touring Doctor rings your bell.

If before this, your air becomes
          Exhausted or if any of your family
          Is critically injured, administer
          The capsules marked ‘Valley Forge’

(Red pocket in N° 1 Survival Kit)

For painless death. (Catholics

Will have been instructed by their priests

What to do in this eventuality.)

This announcement is ending. Our President
          Has already given orders for
          Massive retaliation — it will be
          Decisive. Some of us may die.

Remember, statistically
          It is not likely to be you.

All flags are flying fully dressed
          On Government buildings — the sun is shining.
          Death is the least we have to fear.

We are all in the hands of God,

Whatever happens happens by His Will.

Now go quickly to your shelters.

Sua atenção por favor

A ORVALHO Polar adverte que
          Um ataque de foguete nuclear de
          Pelo menos um milhão de megatons
          Acaba de ser lançado pelo inimigo
          Diretamente em nossas maiores cidades.

O noticiário levará

Dois minutos e quinze segundos para concluir,

Você terá portanto no máximo
          Oito minutos e quinze segundos
          Para cumprir os requisitos
          De proteção publicados no Código
          De Defesa Civil — seção Ataque Atômico.

Uma Massa especialmente reduzida
          Será irradiada até o final Deste noticiário —

Cerimônias protestantes e judias
          Serão iniciadas simultaneamente —

Selecione imediatamente seu canal

De acordo com as instruções

No Código de Defesa. Você não

Deve levar os queridos bichinhos (incluindo pássaros)

Para o abrigo — eles consumirão

O ar fresco. Deixe o velho e caduco,

Você não pode fazer nada por eles.

Lembre-se de pressionar o botão de lacre
          Quando todos já estiverem no Abrigo.
          Estabeleça a radiação
          Do ar, de acordo com o contador geiger.

Desligue a Televisão agora.

Desligue seu rádio tão logo
          O noticiário encerre. Na mesma hora
          Fixe tapa-explosão nos ouvidos
          De cada membro de sua família. Retire
          Seu frasco de plasma. Dê às crianças
          As pílulas marcadas um e dois
          No recipiente verde CD, então as coloque

Na cama. Não deslacre

A entrada de ar interna até

Que a radiação tenta se Dissipado Inteiramente

(Observe o marcador em seu

Painel Perspex) ou o Serviço

Médico Local tenha dado o sinal.

Se antes disto seu ar tiver

Acabado ou se qualquer um de seus parentes

Estiver em situação crítica, administre

As cápsulas marcadas “Valley Forge”

(Bolso vermelho no Estojo de Sobrevivência no. 1)
          Para morte indolor. (Católicos
          Terão instruções de seus padres
          De como agir em tal eventualidade.)

Este noticiário está acabando.
          Nosso Presidente Já deu ordem para
          Retaliação maciça — isto será
          Decisivo. Alguns de nós devem morrer.

Lembre-se, estatisticamente
          Não é provável que seja você.

Todas as bandeiras se agitam cobrindo inteiramente
          Os prédios do Governo — o sol está brilhando.
          Morte é algo que não devemos nunca temer.
          Estamos todos nas mãos de Deus,

O que quer que aconteça será a Sua vontade.

Agora vão rapidamente para seus abrigos.

          Tradução de Floriano Martins

Soliloquy at Potsdam

There are always the poor —

Getting themselves born in crowded houses,

Feeding on the parish, losing their teeth early

And learning to dodge blows, getting

Strong bodies — cases for the warped nut of the mind.

The masterful cat o’nine tails, the merciful

Discipline of the hours of drill — better

Than being poor in crowded Europe, the swan-swept

Waters where the faces dredge for bread

And the soggy dead are robbed on their way to the grave.

I can hear it from this window, the musket-drill

On the barrack square. Later today I’ll visit

The punishment block. Who else in Europe

Could take these verminous, clutching creatures

And break them into men? What of the shredded back

And the broken pelvis, when the side-drum sounds,

When the uniformed wave tilts and overwhelms

The cheese-trading burghers’ world, the aldermanic

Principalities. The reformers sit at my table,

They talk well but they’ve never seen a battle
          Or watched the formed brain in the flogged body
          Marching to death on a bellyful of soup and orders.

There has to be misery so there can be discipline.

People will have to die because I cannot bear
          Their clinging to life. Why are the best trumpeters
          Always French? Watch the west, the watershed     

Of revolution. Now back to Quantz. I like to think

That in an afternoon of three sonatas
          A hundred regiments have marched more miles
          Than lie between here and Vienna and not once
          Has a man broken step. Who would be loved
          If he could be feared and hated, yet still
          Enjoy his lust, eat well and play the flute?

Solilóquio em Potsdam

 Ali estão sempre os pobres —

Conseguindo criar-se a si mesmos em suas casas abarrotadas,
          Comendo nas paróquias, perdendo seus próximos dentes
          E aprendendo a evitar porradas, tornando seus
          Corpos resistentes — exemplos para a aberrante noz da
                                                                                     mente.

O rabo do gato controlador das nove, a misericordiosa

Disciplina das horas de treino — melhor

Do que ser pobre criatura na Europa abarrotada, as águas

Cisne-varridos onde os vultos arrastam-se pelo ganha-pão

E os mortos encharcados são roubados a caminhado da
                                                                                     sepultura.

Eu posso ouvi-los dessa janela, o treino-mosquete

Na quadra de vaias. Mais tarde visitarei

A ala dos castigos. Quem mais na Europa

Suportaria essas verminosas, azunhentas criaturas

E nelas faria romper homens? Os das costas esfarrapadas

E das pélvis quebradas, quando soa o tambor-secundário,

Quando acenos uniformizados inclinam-se e oprimem
O comércio mundial de cheeseburghers, os organismos   Senatoriais. Reformistas sentam-se à minha mesa,

Eles são favoráveis mas nunca viram uma batalha
          Ou observaram o cérebro modelado no corpo açoitado
          Caminhando para a morte num ventre inchado de sopa e
                                                                                     ordens.
          Ali se vive na miséria ou então se é disciplinado.

Pessoas terão que morrer porque eu não posso suportar,

Seus apegos à vida. Por que os melhores trompetistas
          São sempre franceses? Observe o oeste, as águas passadas
          Da revolução. Agora de volta ao Quantz. Eu gosto de pensar

Que numa tarde de três sonatas

Uma centena de regimentos deve marchar mais milhas
          Do que mentir entre aqui e Viena e não depois que
          Um homem tenha interrompido seu passo. Quem o teria
          amado Se ele pudesse ser temido e malvisto, porém quieto
          Desfruta sua luxúria, come bem e toca flauta?

Tradução de Floriano Martins

Página publicada em fevereiro de 2018