Winterlight Poem by Jan Oskar Hansen

Winter-light
No one walks on the old road anymore, not even on a day
when almond trees are in bloom. Blue weed and thorny
bushes are shooting through, one day the road will be out
of sight. It leads to a ruin of a house, doors and windows
long since stolen, a door frame made of carved stone too;
half the roof has caved in. A vagabond lived in the ruin for
a time, till gruff voices told him to get lost. I saw him slowly
fade away, erased by shimmering winter light.

He must have walked long was found in a grotto, seeking
shelter from the rain. Three days dead, they said. No saintly
women came, cleansed and wrap his tired body in a shroud.
Funeral at five witnessed by a pale functionary of the state.
Church bells didn’t toll. No one walks on the old road
anymore, not since the bushes grew eagle’s talons and a boa
constrictor took abode in the ruin.