A CONSOLATION DOG
Accept, my friend, a consolation dog,
a lovely dog, a thing of beauty.
It’s made of nothing and all its traits
are rainbows: unfailing bridges
over a rivulet of simple music—
you’ll soon know it by heart.
There floating by is your new, eternal wreath:
buds of candles, flowers of torches.
How this reminds me of fortune-telling,
when they knock at the embers:
sparks fly out
and are counted,
but as in a dream,
when
they
freely spread out
their painted sails.
Yet it’s not the winds that drive them,
but unknown voices.
These ships are ancient, rowing ships.
Their wine-gold oceans
carry us to consolation,
along the merry, lofty isles
stored up for a happier life,
on tender, cutting waves.
What is the roar of waves telling us?
And what is the Nereid saying?
It’s as if someone is thanking us,
keeping a hold of our hand:
“Onward, my poor wanderers!
The bottom of life is simple:
a clean cloth pulled tight
across an embroidery frame.”
It’s not in vain that we walk the hungry deep
as though around the house.
Here reverie embroiders in gold,
and the unforgettable paints
its pictures and names onto a wave:
here is the ball of childhood,
here the lovers’ tryst,
and this is simply a winter’s day.
Here is music framed by a filigree
of nighttime bushes and villages.
Such precious work. Forget it.
And further on: a lime tree.
The lime tree by the city gates.
And Christmas.
And now—there’s nothing to see.
Yet this is the best thing to see.
And when, however much a shame,
we too will be no more,
we shall surely find ourselves
somewhere quite close to this . . .
Accept, my friend, a gift of my deep sorrow.
For beauty is much stronger than our hearts.
It is a fortune-teller’s cup—
the most translucent vessel for the incredible.
8. THE KING AT THE HUNT
My horse where art thou taking me?
Take me wherever thou will.
My soul is armored safe,
and life is ever free
to rule over itself
and hunt with fierce dogs,
to make cures with eastern potions,
or deal out maladies,
to feed itself in secret
on bears’ and foxes’ milk,
or lie between two lovers
like an old, unblemished sword.
And if—most strange and distant dream—
she stands before me pure?
Not that she is faithful, but because
you can’t exhaust
the depths,
can’t comprehend
the heights;
whoever’s gone beyond Hades’s gates
will never come back, at least
that’s what they say.
O, woman’s will is rude and coarse,
she has no fear, she is
an unrelenting slave . . .
Deer,
my friend,
run on, if it be fate
for you to escape . . .
Yes, rude and coarse and knows
everything once and for all.
Weakening, meanwhile—
that is our handiwork.
9. A DWARF TELLS FORTUNES BY THE STARS
(and also about leprosy)
O leprosy, all ancient horror
can fit into this one thing alone.
Immortality itself seems to sink
like a stone at the very sight of it:
can
