Gunter Kunert
Bucolic Elegy IX
The gardener comes to know
death. Leaves are dying en masse
like unteachable hordes of people.
The foxglove ages grumpily
bowing low: where has all my beauty
gone to? Nature’s
greenery reverts to rot.
The gardener suffers through each autumn,
allegorical Nature.
Beneath his soles the dried-out leaves complain
undiscerning: last lamenting sighs.
In the rain barrel floats
Ophelia, garbed
in graying fur.
Wherever the gardener looks: the coma
spreads itself out.
Who ever’s going to re-awaken life?
The gardener knows how to wait and
thinks: this all comes back with time. Just
the gardener won’t.
Translated by Gerard Chapple
Page(s) 94
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