portrait of the rain
By Jan Wagner
Translated by David Keplinger
it appears as a hand-kiss, gentle nudge,
spray of memory: remember
where you came from, frog.
or galloping, as a thundering horde,
to tender unto caesar what is caesar’s,
until everything flees into the entryways
under the cover of newspapers
and briefcases: whoever listens at the open window
senses that he may be dry, but the weather
has long since been inside him.
or how the gutters become musical,
when laundry lifts off the lines
and rivers flow out of their beds,
and the secret scent of earth and asphalt
unveils itself; when mushrooms, mosses,
vineyard snails run rampant;
it makes the outlines visible: where rain ends,
we begin.
it treks across the landscape like a circus,
the spectacle and curtain at the same time:
scenery loft of the great weather-
and wandering theaters; bestows upon blonds
darker hair, and on the bald the radiance
of billiard balls; to the hens it is a cage
that doesn’t imprison them. so often divined,
yet no church is founded on it.
good ears can still hear,
if you bend low enough,
the songs of humpback whales, glacier calving—
one geyser over north america
inspires umbrellas to blossom
from shanghai to rome.
each drop contains the whole book, water,
particles, pollen, all the dirt of the world.
resurrection—the easiest exercise.
meanwhile it slumbers in car tires
and from puddles and cisterns
stares back toward its own origin,
while the trees for hours and hours
are immersed in their soliloquies.
the soothing swoosh between the radio transmitters.
the wind in the forests yet to come.
Translated from the German
Notes:
Read the German-language original, “regenporträt,” and the translator’s note by David Keplinger.
Source:
Poetry
(April 2024)
