Jaan Kaplinski Poems

I could have said: I stepped from the bus.
I stood on the dusty roadside where
a young maple and dog-roses grew.
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Silence is always here and everywhere;
sometimes we hear it more clearly:
on the meadows there is mist, the door of the granary is open,
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Destruktivität ist das Ergebnis ungelebten Lebens.
Destructivity is the result of an unlived life.
What cannot grow up grows down —
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Prayer is just what remains
when all is said and there is nothing more to say
God is what remains when all in which one can believe
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Things didn't remember their names and I have begun to forget them
memory's like a pocket riddled with holes that cannot hold change
words or ideas and some in the Dark Ages knew this already
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I fear those who are afraid of emptiness
I fear Pascal but not probability theory
I do not fear Roman antiquities for they
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The possibility of rain… If rain is possible
everything is possible: spinach, lettuce, radish and dill,
even carrots and potatoes, even black
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The lilac branches are swaying in the wind
and shadows creep across the floor from the open balcony door,
swaying too. Today I washed the windows
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I write a poem every day,
although I'm not quite sure if these texts
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The washing never gets done.
The furnace never gets heated.
Books never get read.
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