Babelgeek

As a global blog, we try to post in the original language of, for example, our poet or event's home country plus a translation.

We've recently been asked about this again. So here goes...

Don't worry. Not everyone speaks all languages. If you don't speak the language featured, here are some tips:

1. Start learning - as poets we should be learning new words and improving our language skills all the time, nothing helps this process as much as learning a new language. Also you can start to read and translate other poet's work in different languages. (Machine code counts btw - see, you are already a linguist.)
2. Copy the text and take it to a free translator like http://uk.babelfish.yahoo.com/ or http://translate.google.com/. They are not perfect but they'll give you the gist and get you started. You may need to refine the tricky bits (e.g. of a poem) by using an online dictionary such as http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/Wiktionary:Main_Page.
3. Go with the flow; you may not understand everything but I bet you can understand a bit (the rhythm?) and that bit may be enough to open a door...

Enjoy! And look forward to seeing your translations.