Across the empty page moves a human hand,
skin, flesh, fingernails and bones.
But held by three fingers, slanted toward the good
and evil of the world, is the pencil, firm and true.

Outside howls the wind or the city or history.
The gazing eyes have become inscrutable.
The heart beats against the chest ceaselessly,
but the mouth is mute and cannot explain

why every moment contains a special misery
felt by everything that breathes. The hand writes.
And the time will come when this dark pain
will rise from the page and bring us back to life.

Translated by Billy Collins and Mardi Valgemäe