Ilya Gutner
from End of June 2010

Let’s understand what is not hidden,
That terminology and truth
Are not a mirror and its image;
Nor unreflecting hurry – good.

And in the evening backyard shade
The light slain by the neighbor trees
Falls peaceful on the bleeding plate.
And it is wise to sit in peace.

*

But fierce cuts the catamaran
To make the point of rendezvous
Where the white winged Leviathan
And the White Whale bid all adieux.

*

Sea sickness: everything depends
On staying true to my own lungs.
Enchanted circles on the edge
Of the serrated probable.

Enchanted circles round and round –
Away from this harsh orphanage
Which used to be the Mother Earth! –
The whales are leaving for the stars.
*

While in bright rooms all kinds of people
In different ways do not perceive
That there is no such thing as simple
Emotions about dying seas.

*

The suburb shouts behind our backs
The names of strangers who let live
While we respect their mute demands
Like the harsh silences of myth.

We sit there like the evening shades
As light escapes the neighbor trees
And falls upon our bloodied plates.
And it is wise to sit in peace.

*

There where I go to read, there at the sea,
There at the sea where in despair I go
From stiff complexities and thoughts of grief
Which overtake me in the night of hope,

There at the sea forgetting hesitation
Light I leapt up upon the steepest rock
And read twelve lines of infinite duration
Unto that murmur which will never stop.

*

Strange intersections of the flying cosmos
Or sleek entwinings of the growing world
But He spoke less and less and I more loudly.
And then I understood I was alone.

There was a tattered book clasped in my hand,
My clothes were torn from walking through the brambles
And a dark cloud concealed the sounds of language
And all around was strange to understand.

*

What have I learned except not questioning
The seed’s bizarre necessity of growth?
Strange news begin for me in Genesis
At chapter four; most strange the Book of Job;

And strangely sounds that God, too, might be tortured
About this world. But through the haze at last
I saw Him weep over the dying ocean
And did not dare to whisper: Thou art blest.

<< return to the Table of Contents for New Series #3: Summer 2010, Volume 2 Number 1