The roof-poles in those days

were like the masts of Columbus,

every crow on their pinnacles

announcing new shores.

Along the streets strolled knapsacks,

and words of a foreign country

plunged into khamsin days

like the cold blade of a knife.

How could the small air support

so many recollections

of childhood and of withered loves

and rooms grown empty elsewhere?

Like blackening snaps in a camera,

their images reversed:

white winter nights across the sea,

rainy nights of summer,

capitals dark at dawn.

Behind you foreign footsteps drummed

the marching songs of an army,

and on the sea you thought you saw

the church of your old town floating.

Not for a long time now has anyone waited for me.

Who will wait for a ship if there is no sea?

The circle draws in. Short is the way.

What’s there to say?

Another year? Another month? Another day?

I shall lie under the earth, bnut something will remain above.

Somebody will hate somebody. Somebody will love.

The account is unsettled. Short is the way.

What’s there to say?

Another year? Another month? Another day?

The dew falls and the evening chills my face.

At the street corner the same bus stops at the same place.

Tomorrow I shall wake again,

And again I shall say,

‘Dear God!

Another year, another month, another day.’