Fly of the twilight color
Antennae without head
Feet with wings still
Growing
Growing
Night still breeding
The terrors of the shrouds
The cries of Tenor-Ghost
The dread of suffering
The brink of Dawn
This poem has not been translated into any other language yet.
I would like to translate this poem
This poem begins so precisely with one of nature's tiniest, almost invisible creatures - the fly whose color makes it blend into the night. Then there is a gigantic leap and we are at the other end of the continuum of life with the origin of things NIGHT STILL BREEDING. But what is being bred is terrifying - THE TERRORS OF THE SHROUDS/THE CRIES OF THE TENOR-GHOST - chilling metaphors. I took the closing line THE BREAK OF DAWN to mean daylight dispels these night terrors. But perhaps it means the NIGHT breeds both terrifying and benign things. For his tombstone Yeats wrote (in part) : Cast a cold eye on life, on death. That would be one way of dealing with this alien world we are must confront. I wonder what the Monsignor would say? ?