The words on these pages belong to Lars Kvande, who gracefully gave permission for Kim to translate them from Norwegian to English, and also inspired Kim's own poetry journey.
Poetry isn’t easily translated, it has to be re-imagined. As much as possible Kim has endeavoured to preserve the original intentions or thoughts - Lars and Kim share values and perspectives through a life-long friendship, which made it easier - but at other times the translation may inadvertently have given the words a different meaning or context.
Most importantly, though, poetry is personal, both writing it as well as reading it. The very purpose of poetry is to engender reflection. This book is a collection of Lars’ poetry over a decade or so. It is also a tribute to his son, Lars Kristian, or ‘Larsa’, a fellow traveller of the mind who is no longer with us, but always will be.
The book contains evocative and stunning photography by Christer Nexmark. His brief was simple, these are my words, Lars told him, let your lens do with them what you will. A year or so later, this book came to life. A visual and spiritual journey of life, love and loss.
There is also a selection of Kim Wingerei's own poetry. Kim says "all my poetry has a message that has meaning to me, but what it means to you, the reader, may be very different. And that's the way it should be."
