Explain Me Love

by Ingeborg Bachmann

Ingeborg Bachmann

Your hat lifts itself quietly; greets, floats in the wind,
your uncovered head has done clouds,
your heart is busy elsewhere
your mouth absorbs new languages,
the quivering grass in the land is taking over,
Summer blows star flowers on and off,
blinded by flakes you raise your face,
you laugh and cry and perish on yourself,
what should happen to you -

explain me love

The peacock, in solemn wonder, beats his wheel,
the dove raises its feather collar,
crowded with cooing, the air stretches,
the duck cries, takes from the wild honey
the whole country, also in the settled park
every bed has a golden dust around it.

The fish blushes, overtakes the school
and falls through grottos into the coral bed.
The scorpion dances shyly to the silver sand music.
The beetle smells the loveliest from afar;
If only I had his sense, I also felt
that wings shimmer under their armor,
and take the path to the distant strawberry bush!

explain me love

water knows how to talk
the wave takes the wave by the hand,
in the vineyard the grape swells, jumps and falls.
So innocently the snail steps out of the house!

A stone knows how to soften another!

Explain to me, love, what I can't explain:
should I the short awful time
dealing only with thoughts and alone
know nothing dear and do nothing dear?
Does one have to think? Isn't he missed?

You say: another spirit is counting on him...
don't tell me anything I see the salamander
go through every fire.
No shudder chases him, and nothing hurts him.





Last updated October 31, 2022