Miroslav Válek - The wings

Miroslav Válek - The wings
(Krídla)

So it is summer. The blind men in Bahon
are lifting their heads above the wall,
above the barbed wire,
they are watching the trains, long and slim like whistling,
they are ripping the weeds, coughing.
Near Cifer a girl is sunbathing
with her hands above her head,
the heavy derricks of oil industry
are crawling to the railway, all are waving
thinking the same.
According to calendar it is August 15th, Mary,
4 o'clock in the afternoon,
The sun is in beer, the thunderstorm is in the air,
the park is full of lush green, and you are nowhere.
I have been saying you all the time :
Come in the right time,
come when the drums are rumbling,
at high noon,
when the swallows in the air give away their autographs
and the things are silent,
come full of anger,
when you are sad as well as when you would rather laugh.
The heads will be again in the windows, the things in order,
everything will be in its proper place again,
we will make an evening party in your family garden,
I will snap my fingers, the apricots will ignite,
their yellow fires will bend over us :
Then as well the grass was bluish and cold like a well,
the rain, punctuated like a tie, hang obliquely from the clouds,
the lightning started in the sky
and extended as far as our kiss.
When the thunderstorm lasted for too long
and too loudly the metal of thunder was beaten,
you said that they would look for you ...
I saw you fly above the yard in darkness.
During that night the earth moved in its bearings,
all stars were created,
the universe trembled like a lamb
and looked for its centre.
The second day after the world's creation the radio played,
they were walking in the rooms,
they were walking, they were talking,
they were breaking bread,
they were ringing with spoons,
ringing,
but nobody noticed your wings, transparent and light.
We caught you, the blindness of mature age,
we were fine,
and what has happened :
On Saturday after fifteen years
an Abel with whom I used to buy the football tickets
said me that we had lost it all long ago,
we had no wings
and it was a sad thing.
So I am at home,
grasping the land,
the land goes with me everywhere,
my land,
the plain of small people,
workers at Kovosmalt and at the atomic power station,
who represent the god six days a week
on the world's construction so sinfully behind the schedule,
beacause all the saints,
responsible for order, took bribes,
and the god's mills worked only for the rich.
I am at home. Eyes full of land and hands full of hands,
I rise inward myself.
Summer in the air. Summer everywhere.
Summer yellow as a wasp chasing us.
Behind the blood-coloured line of the horizon,
in the god's gardens,
where according to theologians should be the paradise,
where the devil's anger hisses, pomegranates explode
and the angels in gas masks,
burning swords in their hands, close their blind circle,
the destiny of man is written.
But we, since we learned that matter is
only a form of energy,
spread our wings easier,
move as well in space as we do in time
and know that this particular place is here with us,
on the ground.
We have a message for you,
you sweet, supposed, coming from our blood :
Think of us,
we were your destiny,
exactly as you are the destiny of those,
who will come after you to cross
the border line line of life.

And who think the same.