Prologue Poem by Fredrik Nyberg

I only grow older
Your head is excessively pale and still.
If Europe's history is true, I want to learn it as one learns
a song. Today when I was going out to buy chips and
chicken the stairwell smelled slippery of soft soap. At Hotel Lautréamont
the statements all the time move upwards through the stanzas. You mop
your forehead with a rose, recommending its thorns.

Translated from Swedish by Jennifer Hayashida