Edith Södergran

Implausible fish bloom in the depths, mercurial flowers light up the coast; I know red and yellow, the other colors,— but the sea,det granna granna havet, that’s most dangerous to look at. What name is there for the color that arouses this thirst, which says, the saga can happen, even to you— Translated from the Swedish by Averill Curdy

For my little ballads, those strange, sunset-red laments, spring paid me a gull’s egg. I bade my lover paint my portrait on its thick shell. He painted a new bulb in brown soil— on the other side, a powdery mound of sand.

when all the golden birds fly home across the blue deep water; On shore I sit rapt in its scattering glitter; departure rustles through the trees. This farewell is vast and separation draws close, but reunion, that also is certain. My head on my arm I fall asleep easily. On my eyes a mother’s breath, from her mouth to my heart: sleep, child, and dream now the sun is gone.—

That the stars are adamant everyone understands— but I won’t give up seeking joy on each blue wave or peace below every gray stone. If happiness never comes, what is a life? A lily withers in the sand and if its nature has failed? The tide washes the beach at night. What is the fly looking for on the spider’s web? What does a dayfly make of its hours? (Two wings creased over a hollow body.) Black will never turn to white— yet the perfume of our struggle lingers as each morning fresh flowers spring up from hell. The day will come when the earth is emptied, the skies collapse and all goes still— when nothing remains but the dayfly folded in a leaf. But no one knows it.

The red sun rises without intent and shines the same on all of us. We play like children under the sun. One day, our ashes will scatter— it doesn’t matter when. Now the sun finds our innermost hearts, fills us with oblivion intense as the forest, winter and sea.