Dismemberment

***

Someone took off the leaden lid. Someone
removed the plate of lead with an idle hand
above the boiling concoction,
and it spurted out in the open.
Neither hissing vapor
nor a jet sweeping away all filthy vermin,
incandescent with passion and will,
but poisonous, brown torrents of mucus
creeping downwards to the charred trunks,
wisps of yellowish stench slowly covering the sky.
Cover the sky again.

***

When you happen to meet a man among a flock of sheep
You must make an effort not to name him a shepherd.


tr. by Zdravka Evtimova