this way Poem by Cees Nooteboom

It could have been this way:
something filthy longs for something dirty for the morning,


the painted rose
wants to be in the masterpiece.


The small begs for something smaller yet
for the road,


the big goes shopping
at giant shops.


It is so hard to defend yourself.
You see the butterfly, already bigger by a hand,


you see the flowers plowing soil,
the worm as snake.


This is the weight
that bursts the scales.


To have shared all that
With time as a hairdo,
As a god of a short-lived universe.


That, dear friend, was life
And it is what it was.