New poem for his latest collection by the Swedish writer Lars Gustafsson

All iron longs to become rust,

said the old metallurgist

It wants to unite with the air

sink down to the bed of lakes

Become red earth. Not only iron

longs for its disintegration.

Utopias subside powerlessly

and become rhetoric. Even

proud monotheism rusts

away and becomes pleasantly

teeming amoral

polytheism. Sharp blades

gleaming swords and heavy axes

never last eternally.

All iron strives to become rust.

Said the old metallurgist.