The rows of crates are lined up in the vineyard,
Crates where raki and exquisite wines lie sleeping,
Rows like lines of verse,
Sometimes scanned, sometimes free.
No one asks the grape-pickers
Why the lines are long or short.
It's enough if they produce
A heavy wine or a twenty-percent raki.
Dritëro Agolli (1931 – 2017) Albania
Translated by Robert Elsie
Source: An Elusive Eagle Soars: Anthology of Modern Albanian Poetry edited and translated with an introduction by Robert Elsie, UNESCO Collection of Representative Works, European Series, Forest Books, 1993
No comments:
Post a Comment
Please keep your comments relevant and free from abusive language. Thank you. Note that comments are moderated so it may be a day or two before your comment is posted - irrelevant or abusive comments will not be published.