martynovashadows

When shadows and dragonfly wings lengthen,

Stretch out along the riverbank in a lethargic glow,

Time will inaudibly give its sleighbells a shake and

Herd goats under the roof of evening… And with the shadows,

The tick-tock of quiet clocks leads an inaudible conversation.

Or else

When the sun’s just come up, and the tea’s gone cold, and the vodka

Loses its taste in the predawn amalgamation,

Some kind of sloppy crap

Settles inaudibly to the bottom… In conversation,

Fear and the tick-tock of quiet clocks whisper to one another.

Everything in which the inaudible words “it’s time” appear

Begins to seem now like the prologue to an unrealized piece of theater,

When the script’s been read already, and the play

Rustles with dresses, and there’s no one to blame,

But there’s still time to tarry and finish the cold tea that remains,

And also to picture some kind of Chinaman

Who found himself on that side of the great wall of China,

Which turned out to be laid not in stone but in time,

And one can clearly see how his innocent dreams

Slip through invisible wrinkles,

Like the tick-tock of quiet clocks.