Drift

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Drift

 

Translated by Agnes Marton

 

  

You didn’t say anything

but he took it as a promise,

he took it as if you’d sailed so far from the shore

that you couldn’t see the way back.

 

Your life will be there

where you want to own everything,

you give names even to the plants,

and the names feel awkward

like pets’ dresses.

 

There will be kids as well, 

they will cry,

in them, there’s still too much of the sea,

rockeries of the self

haven’t emerged yet out of them,

they are like water’s mirror,

when leaning above them

anybody can see their faces,

they are so young,

they always seem to take after

the person watching them right then.

 

It’s not monsters or

ghosts they are scared of

but animals that went extinct,

zebra-wolves, 

Javan tigers,

barbary lions,

on their mind

those hide under the bed

and take revenge.

 

There will be happiness too,

spreading at an easy pace

like the heavy smell of food in the corridor

that is impossible to air out of your clothes

even after forgetting the taste.

 

You know, 

there the time comes

when you don’t die yet,

only you won’t ever be awake at the same time

and you won’t be able to warn one another.

 

Like when you fall asleep after a long struggle

and the train stopping under your window

suddenly wakes you up,

and you are aware

the only passenger

is sound asleep

and he won’t be startled

when he should alight.

 

 

 


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