Níkos Davvétas
From: The Yellow Darkness of Van Gogh (1995)
The Doll's House in Arles
a severed ear floats on the stream like a plane-leaf;
Sometimes we would whisper in that ear
during public ceremonies, in private moments
sweet words, or severe
now in the earth it can't make out
the footsteps of him who dripped
poison into its labyrinth
nor shudder at the grinding of the knife
on the iron biers of Arles
it remembers only the Spring
when birds nest in the roof
and the dolls stir their stitches a little
stretching their sickly limbs
trying their rusty joints on the boards.
In the heat the black Symplegades open
only the cicada passes
on a palm-breadth of light
to sing monotonously
for those who wake with their thoughts on death
but lightly put it off till tomorrow
secretly hoping
all might begin again from nothing
just as every March
a new world turns green
and fondly the worms can remember
corpses preserved by the Winter's frosts
and rain-washed roots
like horns buried
in that wandering headless body
can take hope
in Van Gogh's yellow darkness.
Translated by Simon Darragh
Page(s) 184
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