THE JUG Poem by Tsjêbbe Hettinga

He drank, his eyes catching the confused blue eyes of the
Black-clad fisherman's widow beside the spring, standing in
The sultry shade of a bashful cedar, the sharp reek
Of resin and fish, a glimpse of sea and boats, now empty.
She stood still, her sunken eyes seeing him drinking in
A night of smothered cries and thirsty love, while she balanced
The water jug on her shocked shoulder - beside her
A donkey, blue and still; through the pale white ear of her arm
The sea; beyond her hips the surf, and in between them,
Struck dumb by the stormy winds of a moment of silence:

They had drunk, and seen the fishermen in their boats grow
Slowly smaller, while the net of stars, dripping with promise,
Had grown fuller and more taut, two half moons had floated
Into a green harbor, and the wind had sprinkled salt on
The broken ice in the glasses on a terrace with
Black hoses and white buckets; and he had followed the path
To her hut (much later than she, up the hill, through the
Dark alleys, away from fisherman's knives), just as she had
Described it to him, sensing that he would come, and he
Had climbed her hill, had slaked his thirst on her obliging jug.