Cloud formations are on the move in constantly changing shapes
look, a dog stretches out its paws and now stands upright
with their shadows the phantoms crawl up the hills
and wet the patchwork quilt, my love, until the sun colours the mountains
mauve like my head, stampeding and balding as the rocks
into which the sea burns holes - only the gulls can still see me
maybe also Fergus who was foaming from laughter even
a long while after John Joe with the wild roses went to roost
stones can't die his daughter said they just get
older while the swallows show me their white small bellies and the
dolphin in our bay waves her tail at me - with the V
of disavowing in the water above the vanished houses, the V
of the deserted village past the V-shaped traffic signs
in the V-valley where I will find you: I bring the virgin fire of
your song into virtual safety, invisible to the hunters of the night

A donkey cuddles a sheep and a ox yawns in a meadow
amongst the rabbits - it is like snow and sun all at once where your
hideout is, with the waves that I can hear even though I can only
see them one by one in feverish dreams, with the cliffs where it rains upwards,
drops that dry before they can fall on my V-veined feet
I go on looking for you: under a patch of fog, under a rainbow
cloudless becomes crowdless, you glisten between two peaks
you flash between the opposing poles of life, singing for the
victims of the famine, fodder for the dogs, fodder
for death - like a mangy terrier in the middle of the track
I attack a car for here the roles are reversed
you crash into a farmer, pay the cow and wires in the sky
are for the rooks - a V gate keeps livestock out; there
you sit by the well studying the harebells, you fly up

Void of division you fiddle above the V cleft, you warble
hey Paddy, I'm taking the piss, come vanish with me

Translation: John Irons