Wednesday, October 21, 2015

MICHAEL KRUGER ~








 

What Times Are These




Yesterday, in the wood,

a serious talk

with the trees:

if we had our way,

ran their rustling discourse,

there would be no such thing as nature.

What about us, I asked,

alarmed at the prospect of loss,

what on earth would we do without it?

You'd have to make,

out of second, first nature,

answered the trees,

and deal with it

just as you deal with us.

And in the meantime,

the leaves whispered fervently,

we would run wild, wilder than wild,

so that you, as strangers,

could, later, discover us once again.

When they had said this

they vanished for ever.


 ______________ 

 Diderot's Cat
M I C H A E L    K R U G E R
translated by Richard Dove
selected poems
Carcanet Press 1993