A Little Poem About Longing

Lelaki Budiman

Translated by Daniel Owen

POETRY, TRANSLATION  |  $20 $15

March 2019
OUT OF PRINT
Read an excerpt

A Little Poem About Longing

Maybe not everything requires a reason, like longing’s season.
It comes to you all of a sudden. For no reason, but pleasing.
Do we ever know the reason why we long for each other?
Distance?

We’ve never before merged our distance.
Maybe we long to meet? We’ve never
met before. Longing sneaks in all of a sudden.

We don’t picture each other, though we miss each other.
Because longing is so ridiculously honest, it can’t make up a reason.
The reason for longing is just to long.

Three-color, double-sided broadside letterpress printed at UDP in an edition of 150.

About the Author

Lelaki Budiman works in text and visuals. He is the founder of the small press Tan Kinira, and the author of Percakapan Diam-Diam. Budiman lives in Yogyakarta.

About the Translator

Daniel Owen is the author of Toot Sweet (United Artists Books) and Restaurant Samsara (Furniture Press Books). His translations from Indonesian include Afrizal Malna’s Document Shredding Museum (Reading Sideways Press). He is a member of the Ugly Duckling Presse editorial collective.

Publication Details

Ephemera, Print/Ephemera
8.25 x 10.75 in
Publication Date: March 01 2019
Distribution: Direct Only