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I Bound Up the Trees' Eyes (Tr. by W. D. Snodgrass with Dona Rosu and Luciana Costea)
MARIN SORESCU
CREATION
I write on the face of earthquakes
And if some of my words
Keep slithering away from me,
Blame that on the earth's crust
For lapses from stability.
You don't even know
When, underneath your desk, a volcano's gaping
And after a day of work
You can sign your name right on cinders.
Everything's changing
Its proper place;
The ceiling lamp has got under my chin,
The mountain, skylined, gets inside my mouth-
A gag whose leavings
My descendants will be spitting
To the seventh generation.
From the treetops, the leaves have
For the fear of earthquakes
Moved inside the ground.
Many of my forefathers have
For the fear of earthquakes
Moved inside the ground.
I alone still try to bind-
Like railroads after a derailment-
Just this couple of words
That run, one this direction,
The other, that direction,
Deranged by terror.