Poem by Tjitske Jansen: 'Als iemand mij nou maar had opgeraapt'

If somebody had only

picked me up

and stuffed me into his pocket

and left me there,

that a hand found me now and then

felt how soft I was

and then let go again.

Or placed on the window sill,

on a bedside table,

in a junk box.

The kitchen drawer!

I’ve never been on a journey yet,

Why did I have to take root.

If somebody had only picked me up,

there wouldn’t have been any problem,

I would have been chestnut brown,

I would have gleamed, gleamed,

a bit later begun to wrinkle a bit,

and then, well yes, but now,

now against my will I’ve got to transform

and not such a little bit either.

And always just as I’ve roughly

got used to my new shape,

always when I’ve more or less

accepted

that I am as I am,

I’m something else again.

And if it had been so that I had chosen

to be so, that I wanted to be so:

ring after ring,

so many of the same sort on my branches

in their safe prickly house,

so different from myself,

but how I do remember.

I have given up

being as I am.

I just grow along

with who I am to become.

Now and then I hear

somebody say

How beautiful I am.

In my shadow

things happen

that are worth the trouble.