Michael Donhauser

1956 / Vaduz

[O how the wind brushed through the gardens]

O how the wind brushed through the gardens
so their leaf-dresses whispered when the quinces
covered with down bodied forth so ripe and full
while in the lindens nearby a silvered wind
swelled then fell into the aisles of cherries
whose leaves were already hanging limp or shivering
with the gusts, until witheringly they seemed again
what was - a rustling in the branches and a yielding
in the grass, as if it were us, as if this flowing and
resting were sinking within us and silver still and
inclined towards everything.

Translated by Don Paterson
148 Total read