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Tomas Tranströmer

On the main road into the city
 when the sun is low.
 The traffic thickens, crawls.
 It is a sluggish dragon glittering.
 I am one of the dragon’s scales.
 Suddenly the red sun is
 right in the middle of the windscreen
 streaming in.
 I am transparent
 and writing becomes visible
 inside me
 words in invisible ink
 which appear
 when the paper is held to the fire!
 I know I must get far away
 straight through the city and then
 further until it is time to go out
 and walk far in the forest.
 Walk in the footprints of the badger.
 It gets dark, difficult to see.
 In there on the moss lie stones.
 One of the stones is precious.
 It can change everything
 it can make the darkness shine.
 It is a switch for the whole country.
 Everything depends on it.
 Look at it, touch it…
 

The Tree and the Sky

 There’s a tree walking around in the rain,
 it rushes past us in the pouring grey.
 It has an errand. It gathers life
 out of the rain like a blackbird in an orchard.
 
When the rain stops so does the tree.
 There it is, quiet on clear nights
 waiting as we do for the moment
 when the snowflakes blossom in space.
 

Copyright © Tomas Tranströmer, translated by Robin Fulton