Sunday, 24 April 2022

Cees Noteboom: 'Wolken'

 


Clouds

 

There it was then

the procession of the clouds.

In front the sea clouds, black and storm-laden.

They destroyed entire villages

drowning the animals

in their night-black rain.

 

Lastly the small ones came

with the colours of bats,

skins of barbed wire,

tattered ends of teeth and daggers.

 

They streamed over the plain

and the distant houses.

When the last one had disappeared

the wind curled up

in the silence,

a dangerous dog.

 

We were left behind as no one

in our villages of nothing,

spectres of never more the same

with for ever the ashes and the smell

of the end.

 

No comments: