Tomaž Šalamun
Two poems translated from the Slovenian by Brian Henry
God’s Gums
Let’s say that ants with long eyelashes
darted out of the begonias.
There are no such eyelashes. There are no ants
that would dart from begonias. The very start is
already squeezed. Ants are always composed of
brown hills. They’re undercut and you don’t
know how the hoses, pipes, highways—
they certainly need them for the flow—spurt to
the other half of the axis. God’s gums
show up at crossings. Sometimes workers
on bridges were injected into the concrete.
One worker: he collapsed. A wet mane filled
his helmet and the body under it. There are
gas rods in cathedrals. The refraction of light
embedded in a stained glass window. Boxers
with too shiny flesh weren’t on the scene
back then. Daisies will whirl.
Pigeons rush to the ledge. They need
wings outside. The Holy Spirit is dipped
in basalt. God’s gums no longer conceal this.
It’s not possible to melt rainbows with spit.
Shirt
To tear a shirt and cleanse the soul is essential,
what makes language is accidental.
To burn Joanna Darško.
Jeanne d’Arc has a beak.
A rake stung the bees.
There were no power plants then.
The waters poured freely.
Fields, sweeping masses of soldiers, spears.
Meister Eckhart uses the word
distant exactly like a Ljubljana
teenager uses far out.
I’d lick both of them out of freedom.
I’m licking both of them out of freedom.
They just point with a finger: there!
And there it chokes, uproots, God makes a waterfall over your head.
You lean a ladder on the air and it doesn’t fall.
You pump air with pins.
The earthworm is talented.
It went into the ear hair.
Where it wraps around the stem
like the tree in paradise around the Serpent.