my love nobody knows how in earlier lives
we passed each other by in the street or just missed the bus
in which one of us sat or in which you were my sister my mother
and we weren't meant to meet because

of differences in age or beliefs maybe the space
between us was as concrete as a continent once
perhaps I was busy discovering ways
of starting a fire while you and your lover

were lighting candles on the other side of the ocean
am I holding you too tightly I'm sorry I don't want to crush
you but am happy and sad at the same time

that there will never be more between us
than this universe in which we cannot come together
because it is too small for the grief of two becoming one

my love let time prise us apart when one by one we die
in this life we'll retaliate with bridges of words

Translation by the author with John Irons