A Minor Sentiment Poem by Knuts Skujenieks

Clear-eyed kitten
from the kingdom of tom-cats
when you climb on my shoulder
then I know I am
a needed man

small foolish one
you disarm even a stone
and soften
the stone in my breast
the two stones of my right eye and my left eye
the one on my tongue

time will turn
you into a bored and crippled tom
and me into stone again
but not altogether

because the kingdom of tom-cats is large
and the birth rate exceeds the death rate

Translated by: Margita Gailītis. Latvian literature. Latvijas Literatūras centrs,