°µÍø½ûÇø

BEING AND FIRE

To live life the way the birds do,

fumble the cornfields with fire.

(Rose, with roots in the under water

sound the bell.)

Ìý

To whisper oneself to surfeit

on starchy scraps of breeze.

(Flame unfound in the roses,

shyly blow.)

Ìý

To betray what light is

by the uncovered crumb of bread.

(Love, with two-shouldered pure body

leap and flare.)

Ìý

Ìý

ONE LOVE

I've had great loves in lavish plenty

and numerous filthy flings of youth.

One love I've still, which can content me:

that's telling you the honest truth.

Ìý

Ìý

WORD

Time in fire and the word. And flame, free

in space, that pure one. It is therefore spirit

in the celibacy of raucous fire.

Ìý

Thus naked as the birds of heaven and in garments

of lily perfumes –

it is as it was in the beginning, thus the word

grew heavy in us.

Ìý

Tracks too heavy for such young snow.

Ìý

Look there, dust through chalice-forms

and before it the flower, harried

before the grave and pale and resonant even unto salt. But mutely

strides man, himself of the harried breed, returns

with hands in front

and gropes.Ìý There is no peace, though, in his tracks, no end

to the trailing and dodging of fires,

there are actually no more ways out.

Ìý

And his own received him not.

Ìý

It hobbled blind and thoroughly

alive from the breederies of fiery young and suddenly

retreating... There is no form

and no face that would be alien to the spirit.

Ìý

And man saw that the word was

good.

Ìý

So dust returns,

yes, through bell-forms taken

from the heavy sea salts, to the lap

of earth. But spirit

through lime retreating and blood

to the shell of the egg that roamed

from eternity as far as us.

Ìý

Late incubation sets in and withdrawal of wings

from the pious water, wished

to the form of snow – into the egg

song, full of birds of prayer, locks itself

with the bride of the word, O soul! But you, man,

and mute one, till above the stars

the wind that moves is yours, oh, thither you proudly crane, tower

of the bleached bones of Adam! And from the blowing breeze

on the rope

to the dust hangs the smoky bell. And so night

full of the heart and in the belltower

a spasm.

Ìý

Oh, the harried one, with fires in his tracks, before the gates

of the ground

seeks refuge in the motionless urn.

Ìý

Man was; over the ash he is,

spirit, he is therefore word, which was at the beginning

and lasts.

Ìý

Ìý

NIGHT WHEN I WATCH WITH MARY

A prayer of black velvet, maiden.

Ìý

I want you to listen to the bridal rustling

of the bed linen

at the moment

when the swallow falls asleep on the moon.

Ìý

This morning I saw a living woman.

She was coming from the cemetery

with rain aslant her face

with foaming hair

and deliberate touch of the whole palm.

Ìý

But to you I am coming on the scaffolding, my love,

so that we may speak of earthly bliss,

so that you may unlock my poem,

because the lamp shines only for you, Marion.

Ìý

At night, when the sleeping fishes divide the waters

in two halves,

stars will tremble and the clocks strike midnight

and the frightened birds will circle above their nests,

then,

precisely then

we will go out on the balcony together and with hand

just so

flung in the dark

we will greet the moon.

Ìý

And because your breasts will be startled until dawn,

I will allow you dip

your hands to the elbows

in well-water.

Ìý

Be strong as laundry blue

and for parting flail-armed as a windmill.

Ìý

And afterwards in the hands

that scent of our adventure,

you unimpaired among women,

I shall carry a sombrero

and till dawn

I will catch falling stars

like butterflies.

Ìý

Ìý

APPEAL

Return to me from the star-strewn wind

(with shimmering light your home in air),

inflame me, plunge the dawn's spread hand

in my conscience, seize from over there

Ìý

everything, only the funeral-pyre

of suffering lasts (I love you so

under the roots, I sip the pure

deep dark, and what earth is, I know.)

Ìý

Ìý

TRACKS

I wake alone today to the bright morning

where the blue frost has made its bed of snow.

I'm waiting for you – and the proof is, darling,

see how the traces of the bird-feet go.

Ìý

Ìý

FIRST SPRING STORM

The frightened puppies howl all night,

the birds to treetops are withdrawn.

From darkness endless bolts of light.

Everything finishes at dawn.Ìý

Ìý

ÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýTranslated byÌýJohn Minahane