Poem by: Thom Gunn
Translated by: Agron Shala
I reached the age where words no longer help me:
Instead of guiding me with clear signs of direction
Through the cliffs of the uncertain world,
Or like a trusted monk on the mountain
To escape with wisdom and barrels of brandy
They are pebbles, or barking puppies,
Biting my pants, rolling around at my feet.
Description and decomposition are impoverished
They limit, delay, change like the earth that slides.
And when we moan, dear, what we mean
If we look closely, we will soon avoid
Our tendency to understand;
And either the experience fades
Or our assessments turn into lies.
The barking dogs are a burden on my run,
Tons of it that I'm tearing apart gram by gram.
Give up all my agnostic irony.
To climb to places where I can rest
In the sources of the word, the previous darkness of truth:
And I taste the sweet and moist taste of your tongue,
And I find the exact meanings in your silent mouth.
