No entrance with flourishes needed to occur.
Of a vanishing point no one knew. Everything just
swiftly got smaller in the calmly spread-out realm

of humbleness and indolence; a sky as
dull and light as ash seemed to submit itself,
its hallowing was a veil, approached

the distant mountain ridge which, staying put,
returned to desert. Almost a mercy
to stand still there or to move as silently,

your skirts held high above your head, dwelling
in one's shadow beside the Nile. Was it already sand
from the far side? You seemed never to have arrived,

no world behind you, from way back surrounded
by a changing just as unchanging as uncertain -
powder of grains, fall of light, breath

of evening wind. In the ensuing, river bed
full of absent paths, here was simply a place
where even time was allowed to disperse

and what lived there achieved itself without impatience.

Translation: 2007, John Irons