Journey without Destination

The aeroplane is the great bird of today, a shoe

a bridal palanquin flying in air

there is no more distance between city N and city G

this so-called "long, drawn-out lifetime" will always be

as brief — ah — as a skirt slipping to the floor

when you leap from TV screens in the arrival lounge, caught by unseen cameras

I see your face like snow bared between far mountain peaks

just as I had watched you vanish at the security gate not so long ago

it was just as if you had turned around and come back

in the morning facing the mirror as you dress and do your make-up

and this action is regularly repeated again afterwards

"It's as if I'd been here the whole time, leaving the ground only to come back down"

hermit crabs used to their new houses don't turn on any lights

the back of your tightly done-up dress is like the two halves of a Chinese door

gently opened, you're unpeeled

like a bamboo shoot

"Like an apple in autumn"

what links yesterday to today, memory with reality

is a narrow zipper

on the following day, a repeat performance

a modern reprint of an ancient parable: the hare and the tortoise

which of us will reach our destination first?

as the bus makes its way slowly and with difficulty

you drift above my head like a blank sheet of paper

the aeroplane flying over the low roof of the railway station, once again                                          

Written on 13th of October, 1998

Translated by Simon Patton