This article evaluates and reflects upon the possibilities and impossibilities of poetic translation. The author makes five categorical statements: 1) no two languages have the same phonology, it is impossible to re-create the sounds of a work composed in one language in another language; 2) no two languages having the same syntactic structures, it is impossible to re-create the syntax of a work composed in one language in another language; 3) no two languages having the same vocabulary, it is impossible to re-create the vocabulary of a work composed in one language in another language; 4) no two languages having the same literary history, it is impossible to re-create the literary forms and one culture in the language and literary culture of another; and 5) no two languages having the same prosody, it is impossible to re-create the prosody of a literary work composed in one language in another language.