Lucas Bernhardt is a poet and editor whose Issue 36 contribution presents four translated hexagrams from the I Ching. His literary work also includes editorial practice with Propeller, where he served as poetry editor and later as a senior editor.
The Issue 36 entry places translation at the center of the page. Ancient divinatory language enters a contemporary literary setting, bringing image, judgment, change, interpretation, and compressed symbolic structure into contact with modern poetry.
Four hexagrams from the I Ching
The I Ching is organized around sixty-four hexagrams, each built from combinations of broken and unbroken lines. Bernhardt’s contribution selects four of these structures for translation, turning a classical system of change into a concise literary sequence.
The form is unusually compatible with poetry because each hexagram compresses image, movement, relation, and interpretation. Readers interested in how inherited structures shape contemporary writing can continue through poetic forms.
Translation and interpretation
Translation here requires more than lexical substitution. The hexagram carries philosophical, symbolic, and historical associations, while the English version must remain readable as a compact verbal object. Meaning emerges through selection, rhythm, tone, and the relation among images.
This movement between languages and literary systems connects Bernhardt’s contribution with Uljana Wolf, whose work likewise treats translation and linguistic crossing as active poetic materials.
Symbolic structure and experiment
The hexagram offers a ready-made formal constraint. Six lines create a visual and conceptual architecture before the translation begins. The literary task develops inside that inherited frame.
Readers following the relation between constraint, symbol, and contemporary composition can continue through experimental poetry.
Editorial practice
Propeller identifies Bernhardt as a poetry editor and later as a senior editor. Editorial work adds another dimension to his literary practice: reading, selecting, contextualizing, and presenting the work of other writers become part of the same cultural field as writing and translation.
Portland State University material also records Bernhardt in connection with its Writing Center, placing his work within a broader context of literary editing, teaching, and writing support.
Lucas Bernhardt in contemporary poetry
Bernhardt’s Issue 36 contribution belongs within the wider field of contemporary poets whose work reaches into translation, inherited texts, symbolic systems, and editorial culture.
The four hexagrams show how an ancient structure can become contemporary literary material through careful selection and renewed language.
Further reading
Propeller identifies Bernhardt as poetry editor, while its later staff archive records him as a senior editor. Portland State University material documents his connection with its Writing Center.