Fuga et Vita

American Poetry Review, The, Jul/Aug 2005 by Naiman, Anatoly

1

The only thing that was is gone, as blood is gone,

as spit gone from the tongue, from eyes the salty moisture dried,

a shade slipped from the room, no scar is left, no seam,

on the wall a switch clicked once, out went the light.

Only sufficient reason remains in life to grasp

that all of life is past, everything I know,

only enough of life for life herself,

life and her refrain: don't go, don't go.

It's not so bad because the thing that's gone

was filled with all my love, my very air,

but because of how it was so good, so good,

that without it, nothing's good. Without her.

2

I was only there, where you were,

where however stars align,

the axe-saw carves you out

according to the general templates, life,

where like a special stamp your trace

is everywhere, at every step,

on every grain and cell of water

and blood, and in my brain.

There's nothing that I know

aside from you, but no matter what

I meet, if not engraved by you

in me, it won't be you, but death:

and even if I meet with beauty there

the more the bitter: without that beauty

where there is, in fragrant sweat,

with blood beneath the skin-you.

tr. Margo Shohl Rosen