Excerpt from the book Poem of the Deep Song; translated by Ralph Angel

Landscape


The field

of olive trees

opens and closes

like a fan.

Above the groves

there is a low sky

and a dark shower

of cold, bright stars.

Reeds and twilight tremble

at the edge of the river.

The gray air spools.

The olive trees

are charged

with cries.

A flock

of captive birds,

their long, long tail feathers

fluttering in the gloom





The Guitar


The cry of the guitar

begins.

The wineglasses of dawn

are broken.

The cry of the guitar

begins.

It’s useless

to quiet it.

Impossible

to quiet it.

It cries on monotonously,

the way water cries,

the way wind

cries over a first snowfall.

It’s useless

to quiet it.

It cries

for the distance.

For the sand of the incendiary South

that begs for white camellias.

It cries for an arrow without a target,

an afternoon without a morning,

for the first bird

dead on the branch.

Oh guitar!

Heart sorely wounded

by five swords.