The sound of the shots on lake como Poem by Dieter M Gräf

it's raining, or the sun is shining.

Its way up through this
Maria air to the visibility

of the chapel. Drala

of the branch somebody

dabbed on the rest table;
hovering down on the lake,

chimes of the half
hours falling into
the mountain goat

bells, shots,

lingering here,
for everyone has
been saved who——


—— somebody kisses and somebody kills;

the halo round the dove
like the bat on the way
side shrine, and on it God

heads, lizards, older
than the Son of Man,
twitching with life.

Translated by Andrew Shields