One of Lars Gustafsson's Norberg poems

at evelyn’s bakery in norberg

In Norberg, early on a May morning

the scent of lime blossom and elderflower

from old trees close to old houses can

float weightlessly on the scent of new-baked bread

There is iron beneath us, much iron

immense bodies of ore,

an incalculable number of sleeping grains

that silently twist the compass out of joint

The world goes out as soon as night is over

And undergoes silent transformations

But someone has to be there at sunrise

To knead soft dough between strong hands.

And the wave of heat that surges out

when the oven door is opened

is the youngest sibling of the white exhalation

of long-since mouldered blast-furnace eruptions

The world undergoes sombre transformations

Iron can become swords or sledgehammers

Many swords Many sledgehammers

Many dead Much bread