Conservatory Poem by Hendrik Jan Marsman

The conservatory windows are wide open
inside someone is molesting age-old emotions
the grand piano moans and laments

In the park swallows skim the grass
harvesting air and insects

How to live? For what?
Big questions befitting small answers

As precise as these swallows who give
flitting double-quick

Someone inside suddenly stops playing
curses, closing his piano like a wing.

Translation: Scott Rollins