Body
The spirit is in bed, it has been sleeping away
For hours now, but my body is awake and prowling
The dark streets like an owl intent on its prey,
Heedless of the roosters in the hills, already calling.
It stalks on into the dawn, peers into a drain
Or a murky ditch, trips over a shadow in its way,
Scrapes itself on a stone facade. Rivers of rain
Drum on my head, but can't wash the mud away.
My mouth, which has been silent such a long time
Holding its teeth clenched tight, now opens wide
And I imagine I hear the ocean of wine
That it has swallowed, sloshing around inside.
The blood pumps into the very nails of my toes,
It hits the heels and like an ape leaps up again.
A little ulcer flares like a torch that throws
Red light on an invisible jungle within.
The legs get back into action, the stiffjoints crank
Gunpowder into their muscles to move them, the twist
Of the left knee pulling westward, the other shank
Dragging its faithful shoe towards the east.
The body quivers, it has decided to fly
Above the earth to the yellow throne of dawn ...
But it can't take off with the violations that weigh
Heavily on its mudstained wings, holding them down.
Malicious with impotence -blind mouse forced to suck
At the stony tit of a nut - it has to slog
Heavily on through the rain. It writes on the sidewalk
The words
Live like a bird- die like a dog.
Translated from the Bulgarian
by
Robert Pinsky
