De IJslandse dichter en schrijver Einar Már Gudmundsson werd op 18 september 1954 geboren in Reykjavík. Zie ook mijn blog van 18 september 2010.
Homer, Singer of Tales
One rainy afternoon,
on a ship from a much-travelled dream,
Homer the singer of tales arrived in Reykjavík.
He walked from the quayside
and took a cab that drove him
along rain-grey streets
where sorry houses passed by.
At the crossroads Homer the singer of tales turned
to the driver and said:
‘How can it be imagined
that here in this rain-grey
monotony lives a nation of storytellers?’
‘That’s exactly why,’ answered the cab diver,
‘you never want to hear
a good tale as much as when the drops
beat on the windows.’
When the drops beat on the windows
and the fog gliding into the bay
covers mountain and ocean alike,
nothing worth the telling
except the slush on the streets,
no enchanting song,
no singing sun,
only footprints that vanish
like rain into the ocean,
into the void and the wind
that sings and blows…
Cloaked in grey
time passes along the streets,
the odd bird hovers
dreamlessly above the town,
the clouds’ veils of rain
tighten around the throat
and the dark of night pours
like a net over the world.
A man sails a boat out into the ocean,
there is a singing wave,
there is a sleeping house,
a sail wrung in a dream,
the world ripples
across a black sea
and the lights pass
like flames along the streets.
Vertaald door Bernard Scudder
Einar Már Gudmundsson (Reykjavík, 18 september 1954)
Lees verder “Einar Már Gudmundsson, Jens Rehn, William March, Jayne-Ann Igel, Justinus Kerner”
