Leaves and Shadows Poem by Wolfgang Hilbig

What you start cannot be new -
because you always take what you were given long ago
and sacrifice it:
as with love because I lack
all knowledge: red leaves like the beach trees spread without
moderation on the wayside where I walked long ago...
and did not know the way
and still do not know it now
and do not know the child of the shadow running out in
front of me and know nothing of the sun that brands its
red gold foliage.
And no longer know the autumn
that moves behind my back and to whom I was
a shadow: constantly newly drawn shadows of uncounted autumns.

Translated by Bradley Schmidt