What are we but runaways from tender executioners?
Oh listen to the crowing cock of horrors!
What are we other than a well overflowing?
On the sheets of music, a gale is blowing.
It turns songs inside out, and is done!
The musical finale of annihilation—
The trumpeters stood up. Trumpeters, stand!
The mouthpiece is turning—and
It’s silent! It’s pure punishment.
In order to honor life, it’s silent.
Warm your words in summer poems. No,
Time isn’t waiting. Time grows for the snow.
What are we but snow’s endless fall?
What are we but a frozen waterfall?
Between 11 January 1941 and 22 April 1941
Translated by Lyn Coffin and Zdenka Brodska