De Zweedse dichter en vertaler Göran Sonnevi werd geboren in Lund op 2 oktober 1939. Zie ook mijn blog van 2 oktober 2010 en eveneens alle tags voor Göran Sonnevi op dit blog.

Uit: Mozart’s Third Brain (Vertaald door Rika Lesser)

LXIV

another bird, that flew upward, in the Forum Romanum
up toward the Rostra Maybe a serin, but
I don’t know Flowers were in bloom, flowers I don’t recognize
What may have been acanthus, growing like lupins
And a red flower, close to the ground White butterflies
At the house of the Vestals roses bloomed Up above
the palace and the ruins of villas a falcon flew
Sudden silence of birds At what sort of rostrum do what sorts
of speakers appear I listen to the voices of Europe
I feel no confidence; not even in my own distrust
STEER! We all carry the sparkling diamond oar
Hard; like the gates of Hades Shadows full of unrest
The Curia, restored in the ’30s, in the face of new imperial power
Which senate meets there; which tribunes of the people, if they would now
have audience, even in Hades We move through the centuries
Faced with destitution’s images The blood of the martyrs is clasped, cradled
As if Agave were clutching the head of Pentheus; the blood runs
down into a bowl; a grail The Etruscan votive sculptures
are thin as sticks; are by Giacometti What do the dead
see? What do they see that even the dying do not see? What
Hesperian fruits, shining Pomegranates; golden fruits?
By the Baths of Diocletian are orange trees Hidden
inside there, Michelangelo’s basilica, is full
of power, stone-dead, of the living Small flames burn for believers
Policemen stand in groups, some with bulletproof vests, submachine guns
The door to a bordello stands open Private health clubs
with sauna, massage At Stazione Termini are all kinds of people;
from all over the planet Everything stands wide open, glowing poverty
A beggar woman, emaciated, a shawl over her head, a half-
grown child in her arms, also sleeping, does not wake when you give
her money Which ones listen Which hear the invisible voice The one
with no platform, no altar, who is not even heard at the sacrificial spring in the under-
world, welling up from the rock; clear green water You want
to touch the water, but I stop you Maybe it is also
polluted? We go to the Colosseum, sit there together
on a marble bench, the fragment of one, behold the endless stream
of tourists Shadows in the planetary Hades; we among them
On the Palatine there’s a wedding; we talk to the cats a while Look at
more flowers, butterflies One wholly ordinary sparrow, but a little different
In our hotel room afterwards we make love; fiercely, with great intensity.

Göran Sonnevi (Lund, 2 oktober 1939)