The Present Hour translated by Beverley Bie Brahic

I

Look! A flash
Of lightning invades the sky again tonight,
It takes the earth in its hands, but hesitates,
Stands almost still. Did it think

It was a sentence, a signature, no, it flickers,
We watch it fall, illuminating,
In each other's arms,
Sleep and death.

The lightning, an illusion,
Even the lightning.

An illusion, a form
Unfolding, a dream
That embraces form, and is falling
With it, broken,
Dispossessed of itself, over there
On the very edge of our night here,
...