The profession Poem by Lars Erik Einar Gustavsson

And so this long summer draws to a close.
The days grow shorter
the words a little slower for each year.
I did not choose this profession.
This profession chose me.
It always seemed to me
a trifle bizarre.
The middling, the superficial
always gave applause and laurels
while that which was of pure metal
and fine workmanship passed by without a trace.
It was on its way elsewhere,
one might assume.

Perhaps it meant something
to listen to the uncles
when they played cards on the veranda
and so eagerly insisted
that once a card was played, it was.

Mix the pack and mix again
and the Joker is left out.
And sometimes a card is stuck in
that was never part
of the pack.

Who's shuffling? Who's cheating?
not always easy to know.
Not in a game where everything that succeeds is allowed?

In short: A game continuously played
far out among the lakes
that lie so gleaming in the summer light,
far out on an old-fashioned veranda
where people shout and bang the cards onto the table.

It is a continuous game of cards
out on an old-fashioned summer verandah
that could do with some more paint
where certain characters shout and bang the cards
onto the simple wax tablecloth.

And no one knows where it will end
if it ever does.

And all the time the radio is on.
Not the old set there, you blockheads!
I mean a different one, a so-called ‘inner' radio
where four or five stations fuse
crackling into noise and interference.

And nothing in an intelligible language!

Friends!

I did not choose this profession.
This profession chose me.

Translated by John Irons