The Norwegian poet Torild Wardenær

This is where I have got to, and I expect nothing

This is where I’ve got to, and I expect nothing

not happiness, not understanding eternity.

Only want to put out time and place’s sinkers

breathe as long as is necessary

hold one formula after the other up to the light.

For the body has worn itself out again

is laden with grey matter, lime and gall

it floats on land and on water towards the world’s borders and

hunger finally forces me to eat stars.

I eat them raw.

It is the seventh day, some still remain untouched in the firmament

a piece of Virgo and fortunately the whole Corona Borealis.

The consonants stand in their boxes, the numbers in their rows,

but all this is uncertain, electricity sparks along

the copper ways, in the magnesium pieces and the silver nodes and

we are stowaways.

I manage to stammer out: I love you.

The digested stars light up my stomach and parts of my pelvis.

I take you by the hand, cradle your head.

Are you blind, I ask, has death struck you blind?

I myself have almost been struck dumb from such travel.

 For translations of 25 poems by Torild Wardenær go to here.