Robert Frost said "poetry is what is lost in translation." When I first read that, I thought he meant poetry is what is untranslatable. It made me feel awkward about being a born-deaf poet working in a language I had never heard. I don't feel that anymore; I know now I misunderstood him.
In studying poetic translation, I learned that many leading poets were translators, finding it a noble path in itself. The best poets through the ages have studied and spoke more than one language; bilingualism is almost as ancient as language itself, and is the main experience of humanity today.
Today, I know Frost also meant that poetry itself comes from bridging the gap between languages: discarding cultural references to focus on common experiences, concepts, emotions, and symbols.