Rural Station

    One March day you're sitting
    numb in a cold train.
    With a hyperdermic needle
    you are shot into the heart of Jutland.

    The train suddenly halts,
    tossing you out of yourself
    here where dark and
    light blood meet.

    Muddied fields
    with blots of snow
    keep a despondent eye
    on heaven's white doors

    like small boys
    who haven't eaten
    all their porridge and are afraid
    of their mother.

    A constellation of wild geese
    streaks across the heavens.
    Is it my name that in their harsh,
    mocking and distorted way they fling down?

    Hesitating, as if to investigate
    how much you still dare see,
    a cow loose from her tether comes
    toward you through the mud.
    Silently gives birth to a calf in the snow.

    You turn back, dizzy,
    lose your way in this strange land.
    Forget path and errand.
    Notice only how the thick earth of Jutland
    clutches your shiny shoes.


    Analysis

    Two voices through the wall awaken me,
    one dark and tired,
    one zealously explanatory.
    Sounds, intonations, not words.

    A waterstain on the ceiling over the bed
    resembles a rare orchid —
    but what good is it on the ceiling?
    First and foremost it resembles a waterstain.

    At the top of the window a little bit of blue.
    But what does that say about the weather tomorrow?
    Yesterday's weather I have to remember myself.
    Who knows if it is raining in Rønne?

    Last night I found my philosophy,
    and never have I slept so good.
    But where will I find an excuse
    for my having overslept?


    The Forgotten Son

    Cocksure my brother sallied forth into the world,
    sang himself away between arms and dice.
    Gladly he accepted the world on its terms,
    which for him was the whirling maelstrom.
    It cast him up on various coasts.
    Bit by bit, by different detours,
    he was drawn back to the family farm.
    Here it was he first put himself together —
    what a meeting — he merged with his defeat,
    which Father came out and kissed.
    O Father, had you only waited one day, one hour!
    But nothing but the fatted calf would do
    to feast such a welcome defeat.

    Have I myself chosen the small victories,
    whose meat long ago has been chewed white and dry?
    Have I myself rationed your love,
    these small treacherous love-rations?
    Harmless for others certainly
    like throwing snowballs at a tree,
    like boys spitting against the wind.

    Thy will be done, my Father.
    My bundle is tied, in it a fat white thigh,
    a three days' love-ration.
    Then I'll be lost
    between mountains and springs.
    Thus will I flee from the smoke of my offering
    which was never beaten to earth
    but stood up stiffly like a pillar of shame.

    Years will pass, Father,
    years without love,
    years without fatted calves.

    And then when I have saved
    a pocketful of defeat,
    when my clothes are smeared with grime,
    then I will approach you
    with fierce tired steps:
    Then you will have to love me!


    Morning Prayer

    Vibrant morning,
    separate the sour from the sweet,
    the inside from outside,
    let knives of light scrape away
    my core of sour pride
    so that I can fear
    when fear's hour strikes,
    so that I can hear
    where I...