For Jaroslav Seifert
It is cold, bitter as a penny
I'm on a train, rocking toward the cemetery
To visit the dead who now
Breathe through the gra**, through me
Through relatives who will come
And ask, Where are you?
Cold. The train with its cargo
Of icy coal, the conductor
With his loose bu*tons like heads of crucified saints
His mad puncher biting zeros through tickets
The window that looks onto its slate of old snow
Cows. The barbed fences throat-deep in white
Farm houses dark, one wagon
With a shivering horse
This is my country, white with no words
House of silence, horse that won't budge
To cast a new shadow. Fence posts
That are the people, spotted cows the machinery
That feed Officials. I have nothing
Good to say. I love Paris
And write, "Long Live Paris!"
I love Athens and write
"The great book is still in her lap."
Bats have intrigued me
The pink vein in a lilac
I've longed to open an umbrella
In an English rain, smoke
And not give myself away
Drink and call a friend across the room
Stomp my feet at the smallest joke
But this is my country
I walk a lot, sleep
I eat in my room, read in my room
And make up women in my head —
Nostalgia, the cigarette lighter from before the war
Beauty, tears that flow inward to feed its roots
The train. Red coal of evil
We are its pa**engers, the old and young alike
Who will know us when we breathe through the gra**?