This poem is taken from PN Review 234, Volume 43 Number 4, March - April 2017.
Four Poems
Translated by Adam Elgar
Iscariot
‘Why should I talk, when you have said it all
already? Let me take your word for it.
Just as I did when I surrendered, standing
beside him in his followers’
torch-lit circle. It was like sleep,
the first dream of the night. Although the way
he sat disturbed me, with his back so straight,
his voice so light, rigid and gentle
like an absolution. And I found
the fragrance of his miracles smelled dry,
the fringed scroll of the Law. Another – yet
another – priest, and too much poetry.
I leafed more quickly through it all, knowing
how it would end. Both Cup and Cross. When I
embraced his suicide of words, I tore
...
‘Why should I talk, when you have said it all
already? Let me take your word for it.
Just as I did when I surrendered, standing
beside him in his followers’
torch-lit circle. It was like sleep,
the first dream of the night. Although the way
he sat disturbed me, with his back so straight,
his voice so light, rigid and gentle
like an absolution. And I found
the fragrance of his miracles smelled dry,
the fringed scroll of the Law. Another – yet
another – priest, and too much poetry.
I leafed more quickly through it all, knowing
how it would end. Both Cup and Cross. When I
embraced his suicide of words, I tore
...
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