Behind the waterfall, roaming across rustling fields,
crouched above liverwort, springing from cliffs

at springtide; you used to see them everywhere,
in every poem picturesque passers-by with their orations,

conversations, screams if need be. Lighter the days
in this sublunary world when poetry

hung roseate upon the branches, free
as a burgeoning. Now that would grow real

in a reciprocity of words -
yet stolidly as ever, ignominy and despair
lie in wait for us behind the trees.

Translation: John Irons