The pearly white morning hasn't broken.

Cut from the dark that stands in all the doorways
she is and she is there

for him alone.

For one day dreamt away in this city she took

the long flight back from overseas and now
sits at the table here: so whole and shiny, lilac
garland on her neck and speaking

only with her face while he is talking,
which is actually what makes them possible at all.

On such a night the rains pelts down

as if the heavens were in desperate
need of relief.

Translation: 2012, Willem Groenewegen