Warm weather - Dostena Angelova-Lavergne

The warm weather

Grows old

The stones: rings

Around the gnawed bones

Of lovers

(suns)

Chariots bent

Under prolonged days

or else,

Chains swollen

In the language of dreams

Ripe mulberries stained the sidewalks

On the eve

They slaughtered ten noons

Offering sacrifice

To the frenzied for blood

Equinox

* * *

In what boredom the trees came into leaf

Under the siege

Of the green:

(On sale after June 30th)

All leaves

All branches are present

(it was drizzling

one of these salty tastes

of loose skies)

They filled the small gardens and yards

Where winter and death used to idle

(Naked bitches - their feet were turning blue)

It was raining in the grass

Souls of trees turned into ravens

Three deaths and something

Separated them from my childhood

* * *

Till flesh

Faints

The tenderness of memories

Dream with a body

Smells the sweet dust of stones

The dust of my grandmothers approaches

My own body

Virgin from death

But touched by nostalgia

Unfulfilled,

Unfulfilled

Will dwell

The eternal birth

Of grass and stone

* * *

Chains

Of endless details

.......................................

Imprisoned the dead

Amidst

Two unspecified worlds

* * *

Did you see? the shoulders of the rain

How they sat up straight

The expectation

in the stone garment

* * *

I stood

on his forehead

Like a night watch without payment

Like the ones who collect birds

(in case they dare to speak)

---

Dostena Angelova-Lavergne (born 1972) Bulgaria

Translated by Zdravka Mihaylova

Source: International Poetry in English Translation