Fall Off, Heart

by Ingeborg Bachmann

Ingeborg Bachmann

fall off, heart from the tree of time,
fall, you leaves, from the cold branches,
who once embraced the sun,
falls like tears fall from the widened eye!

The curl still flies in the wind all day long
around the country god's tanned brow,
clenches his fist under his shirt
already the gaping wound.

Therefore be hard when the tender back of the clouds
bows to you once more
take it for nothing when the hymettos combs
once again fills you

For a blade of grass is of little value to a farmer in the drought,
little a summer before our great sex.

And what does your heart bear witness to?
It swings between yesterday and tomorrow
silent and strange,
and what it beats
is already his fall out of time.





Last updated October 31, 2022