Sini Silveri
The past two decades in Finnish poetry have been a time of self-organization, confessionalism, play, and affect. Several concerns weigh down on the fibers and filaments of poetry, and on the theories that delve into it. In recent years, irony has dissipated for the most part. Navel-gazing has been replaced by the concerted attempt to reach beyond the human.
The authors featured in this selection—Erkka Filander, Pauliina Haasjoki, Niillas Holmberg, Milka Luhtaniemi, Raisa Marjamäki, Maria Matinmikko, Reetta Pekkanen, Juha Rautio, Hanna Storm, Anna Tomi, Taneli Viljanen, and Mikko Väänänen—are unique voices in the panorama of contemporary Finnish poetry. United by a certain sincerity, their assertive work raises perplexing questions. Wonderment—a means of envisioning the new and bringing it to existence—permeates this selection.
Hand-picked from different books and strung together, these poems form a network of root-like, thread-like affinities and intertextual references—a mycelium. Environmental issues, queer writing, activism, performance, havoc-wreaking, and meditation about the world are attributes that weave into each other, to form this network.
The collection begins with Erkka Filander’s opening poem from the book Heräämisen valkea myrsky (The White Storm of Awakening, 2013). As its title suggests, the voice aims at conveying the bareness of sensory impressions, the state of cognitive sensitivity between wakefulness and sleep. Its tone is uplifting and nevertheless able to stand beside itself, to differ from itself, and in this way assert its presence.
Reetta Pekkanen’s award-winning work Pienia kovia nuppuja (Small Hard Buds, 2014) is an emblematic example of Finnish contemporary poetry. While speaking to humans directly (both talking to them and about them), it underscores their inseparability from nature. The themes and rhythms of Pienia kovia nuppuja have influenced the style of more recent poetry books.
Raisa Marjamäki’s poetry includes Ei kenenkään laituri (No One’s Pier, 2014) and Ihmeellistä käyttäytymistä (Wondrous behavior, 2020). Their themes and production methods—down to the printing procedures—reflect a meditation on the environment and the free market’s mechanisms. The concept of the sacred also permeates Marjamäki’s writings.
Pauliina Haasjoki’s career in environmental artivism spans decades. The fact that contemporary Finnish poetry centers a variety of living species—humans appearing as simply one among many—is partly thanks to Haasjoki’s long-term poetic endeavor. This anthology features a piece form the book Planeetta (Planet, 2016).
In the complex landscape of this mycelium, performative poetry has its own special place. Hanna Storm’s pieces from the book Kutsun itseni kylään (i’ll invite myself home, 2018) have been selected because their publication brought attention to the meaningfulness of speech. For Strom, poetry exists when performed, when spoken aloud: intimate, momentary, able to create new spaces. Strom has articulated it in these terms: “how much can a few words—or even just one word, or a smaller unit, like a comma (my favorite feature in poetry) —express. How much can a poem’s delivery or performance convey.”
Another work of performative poetry is Juha Rautio’s Merkittävät puistot alueittain (Significant Parks by Region, 2017). The text is musical and its meanings profuse. Rautio’s poetry hits a nerve in our time, while avoiding ossified forms of expression. The same awareness of ephemerality can be seen in Mikko Väänänen’s work Minä heiluu (I Swings, 2018). The fleetingness of time, fatigue as a conquering force, and the oscillation of the self come to the fore. Väänänen’s background in zen, meditation, and philosophy brings him close to other contemporary poets.
The newest pieces include several from Milka Luhtaniemi’s Kirnu (Churning, 2021). Kirnu displays an active stance, an agency, an ability to carry the concerns about the world’s situation. Luhtaniemi creates sensations, actions, and pursuits in the world, not limited to mere images or poetic structures.
Two poems from Anna Tomi’s Huominen vieras (Tomorrow’s Guest, 2019) are featured here. Huominen vieras is a compendium of prognostic insights. It doesn’t explain itself. It embraces the world sensitively and reasonably. That’s why it’s here.
The last three poets of the section are connected in their efforts to write or represent change. Taneli Viljanen’s production includes “Aavemanifesti” (“Ghost Manifesto”) from the poem-essay on gender-based dissidence, Varjoja, usvaa (Shadows, Fog, 2020). It is not far-fetched to say this piece stabs at the ineffable. Viljanen’s work says what needs to be said and seen, namely that there is no one univocal principle—or even two, for that matter—that can serve as a basis for the construction of the world.
Maria Matinmikko is a versatile writer. This anthology features an excerpt from her philosophical and feminist poetry-novel Kolkka (Corner, 2019), as well as text from the work Värit (Colors, 2017). Both center the political, and address how it can be thought and seen, how vibrant it can be. A piece by Saami poet and activist Niillas Holmberg wraps up the selection, and is taken from Jos itseni pelastan itseltäni (If I Save Myself from Myself; 2015). He is an award-winning and widely translated writer. Thinking in several languages allows Holmberg’s language to inhabit a liminal space, where there is more wiggle room.
In this selection, poetry sneaks away from the expected.
Translated by José Luis Rico
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