Skin as the thinnest palest eggshell Poem by Erik Spinoy

Skin as the thinnest palest eggshell

round-kneed slight body that still panting
closed both eyes.

In the palm of the hand the racing heart of the duckling
that later in a bowl of blue enamel
hung one leg out to float.

The chick was a red-combed white cockerel
that flew at everything that moved and suddenly
beheaded lay bleeding out in meat paper.

Below polystyrene rafters strip neon the cosmos
echoed in an old TV set.

Below the skylight deathly pale mist drifted
in from all the fields.

Translation: 2012, Willem Groenewegen