Thursday, October 25, 2007

514. Dennis Was Very Sick - Yehuda Amichai

Translated from the Hebrew by Yehuda Amichai and Ted Hughes

Dennis was very sick.
His face retreated
But his eyes advanced from it
With great courage
As in a war
When the fresh reinforcements
Pass on their way to the front
The retreating columns of the beaten.

He has to get healthy soon.
He is like our bank,
In which we deposited all we had in our heart.
He is like Switzerland,
Filled with banks.

Already he is smoking one cigarette,
Trembling a little,
And as it should be with a true poet,
He puts the burned matches
Back into the box.

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