Dying in antwerp Poem by Maurice Gilliams

The stone angel on the Cathedral elevates
his scales at midnight for those who collapse.
The army of lice is cracking. Pissing cats
in draftless winding alleys.

Flattened on the knolls of silence,
full-fledged under a rind of sleep, curdled
the laryngeal blood, the skull plucked
bald, the smelly Cocks of torment lie.

Here the rosary's beads are futile;
no mystery remains of flesh and bones
where in emptiness emptiness resides.

The town of streets and the house of rooms:
woe, leave the clock alone. Drink wine, count gold.
The dirt rots underground. Don't pray for skeletons.

Translated by Marian de Vooght