Sarah Kirsch Poems

The sky is smoke grey ash grey mouse grey
lead grey stone grey in the land
of sudden showers of continuous thunder
the bloated meadows the gardens
...

Mornings I feed the swans evenings the cats in between
I walk over grass pass by the ruined orchards
Pear trees grow in rusty ovens, peach trees
Collapse into grass, the fences have long surrendered, iron and wood
Everything rotten and the woods embrace the garden in a lilac bush
...

Ich habe mir in Ferlinghettis Laden
Einen Fahrplan gekauft und sitze im Pullman-Waggon
Und fahre die Küste ab Tag und Nacht und der Dichter
Spiegelt seinen Kuhschädel im Fenster wir fahren
...

Once they're supposed
To have formed forests and birds
Also called dragonflies little
Hen-like beings that
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Last night I awoke knew
That I should say goodbye now
To these verses. That's how it always goes
After a few years. They have to get out
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I've bought myself a timetable in Ferlinghetti's
Store and I sit in the Pullman car
And ride along the coast day and night and the poet
Mirrors his cowhead in the window we ride
...

Exuberantly the green changes
From lighter to darker loveliness
Strongly the sun now extracts
The light from the trees
...