Untitled (Dark Breadth of the Sea) by Pēters Brūveris

dark breadth of the sea,
dunes like creased, crumbling
nameless gods,
on the horizon a lead-grey Sun sinks
and in the sky a fine
shroud of snowflakes;

closing eyes, on inner lids
the grazing touch of glimmering Ostracoderms,
red-streaked snail shell chambers open
and, bass flutes humming,
reveal their beauty’s fossils

a fine snow in my hair;
pack on my back, full of unresuscitated minerals;
my feet feeling the upper sediments,
heart linked to the Devonian, the age of fish;

I’ll thaw like snow;
in the best case scenario like mineral
I’ll be scraped free and put in some strange backpack;
yes, my feet in this century no longer know how to
touch the ground; even though my heart reaches back to the Devonian,
the age of fish!

the sea’s a dark nude
incessant transit of the snails of sorrow
through the provisional harbor of my being;
I write letters to humankind
with spear-grass on my sandy palm…

From: http://www.cerisepress.com/02/04/untitled-dark-breadth-of-the-sea#latvian

Date: 2010 (original in Latvian); 2010 (translation in English)

By: Pēters Brūveris (1957- )

Translated by: Inara Cedrins (19??- )