Hendrik Jan Marsman
Hendrik Jan Marsman Poems
On the edge of the newspaper he sketches skelet
tries to cry but that ancient feeling
evaporates in the loud headline of the sun - instead
he makes some coffee in the bitter realization
...
The conservatory windows are wide open
inside someone is molesting age-old emotions
the grand piano moans and laments
...
Having no faith in big words
in small words, conjunctions
interjections, in the last word
everybody wants and nobody gets
...
If it's someone
then it's that someone
who knocks us down
mows us down, all our grass
...
It's always somewhere, but whoever happens upon it
in some nameless street, usually runs into
a closed door behind which silence reigns
...
Thrown on the paper
in a relentless stream:
The grasshopper with vertigo
...
When they pass away some poets
want the light to die when they go
for the world to end and though
they're furious about their own demise
...
Hendrik Jan Marsman Biography
Hendrik Jan Marsman (14 January 1937 – 29 October 2012), better known by his pen name, J. Bernlef, was a Dutch writer, poet, novelist and translator, much of whose work centres on mental perception of reality and its expression. He won numerous literary awards, including the Constantijn Huygens Prize in 1984 and the P. C. Hooft Award in 1994, both of which were for his work as a whole. His book Hersenschimmen features on the list of NRC's Best Dutch novels.)
The Best Poem Of Hendrik Jan Marsman
After The Depression
On the edge of the newspaper he sketches skelet
tries to cry but that ancient feeling
evaporates in the loud headline of the sun - instead
he makes some coffee in the bitter realization
the world wants to know nothing of his dying
He crawls out of his watch into his clothes
shaves and sees in the mirror
someone rubbing his hands together
ready to strike, to intervene
in constellations and charts.
Translation: Scott Rollins
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