God's Blade of Grass
In memoriam Attila József
I see the red tongue of the summer sunset.
it slicks the silver salt-lick of the light,
and I can feel, approaching like a limpet,
the slowly creeping parched lips of the night.
My blood must quench a mighty thirst one day!
I thought – what fool I was – that I was born
to be this cosmic thirst. Now I can say
that on his head God has a halfmoon-horn,
the seas are puddles that his hoof-prints hold;
the nights and days are following the way
he ruminates; he treads from world to world
as if they were just molehills in the hay.
I couldn't see then that the Milky Way
was gossamer afloat... But now I know:
It's dark and I, God's blade of grass, I sway
on Night's lower lip, softly to and fro.
Translation: March 2005
Translated by Peter Zollman