Shortening the Candle's Wick (Transits)

By turns surreal, political, folkloric, and domestic, Shortening the Candle's Wick is a window into the imaginative world of a poetic relationship. For more than 40 years, husband and wife Andres Ehin and Ly Seppel lived together in Estonia writing poetry. Ehin's style is that of the surrealist--"a connector of the unconnectable"--while Seppel is a poet of the fleeting moment, the glance of language across it. Translator Ilmar Lehtpere has compiled a selection of translations in the form of a poetic dialogue between husband and wife, incorporating larger discussions of poet and language, nation, and self.