Across the Fields and Other Poems
Poetry
By Hans van de Waarsenburg
THE PRAGUE REVUE
02.09.2013
Hans van de Waarsenburg is an award-winning poet from the Netherlands. Here, in Peter Boreas' translation from the Dutch, are poems from 'The Past is Never Dead'(Eyewear Publishing, London, 2013) reprinted with the poet's permission. The following selection is comprised of a kind of archipelago of island lyrics on the experience of the poet's trip to Ireland. The first of which is 'Across the Fields', a poignant and elegiac meditation dedicated to the late Seamus Heaney. Enjoy.
Poetry
By Hans van de Waarsenburg
ACROSS THE FIELDS
By Hans van de Waarsenburg
ACROSS THE FIELDS
For Seamus Heaney
Across the fields, well past the midst
Of life, the shadows of the paths.
The changing of the harsh afternoon light.
A feather in his throat and watching
Things tumbling slowly. Across the fields
The word strides, so slowly that sound
Loses itself, dissolves in the mist over the
Stubble fields. And the walker? He
Peers across the fields at the fading
Horizon. Tries to step out of his
Shadow, while dusk falls around
His head. The dead rustle among
The autumn leaves or rest on the branches
Of the past. If there should be a farewell,
Let it wait and bring a little ‘wood
To the forest and peat to the moors’.
GALWAY
We smelled the smoke in the pubs, gazed
At the peat fires, as if everything would
Last and nothing had changed. Words
Unspoken, suppressed, left in the dunes,
On beaches. Perhaps, you said,
There are journeys one goes alone, if we
Lived without time or need. But wherever
The roads went, ships arrived and I
Looked for your face in every port.
Horizons are but a perspective, ever in
A different light. You voice is parched, you said.
Come here and put your lips to glass or verse.
ARAN ISLANDS
The ferry to the islands cleft the waves.
The holy water swept in from the Atlantic
Across the edges of the bay. A gale
Intertwined our hair and grains of salt
Filled the lines of years. A hand
Covered a hand. Stacks of peat rose
In our heads. Like a pig being
Stuck or crumbling black pudding on
Our plates, steaming amidst apples and
Autumn. But isn’t it spring, you said and
Hummed an old tune in my ear. We stared
At the proud waters of the luminescent sea.
Sailor’s legs felt for the quay. A
Lame duck waddled from the ship. A near-
Dead man was lying on the quay. Drunk, dropped
Out of his frame, tongue still grey with whiskey,
Erosion of Jameson on the lips. Today this is
Our island, you said and pulled me away from
Him. Salt rain corroded the houses. There
Were no trees to carve one’s name in.
Grey the skies, grey the water. No hangover
Lurking here. We gazed across the forgotten
Islands, where stone rules over the dead
Unintelligibly, and the day contracted.
Shivering we covered ourselves in blankets.
The horse’s hoofs clacked steadily,
As if the roads were soft paths, every
Step reversible. Seals were swimming
Towards the horizon. Potatoes lay like
Eggs in the scanty peat. On your lips
I tasted the salt that encrusts stone,
And then you looked at me, looked back
Through my eyes. This is the end of a world,
You said, where old can never age. Where
Time is silence in an urn filled with ashes. Aran,
Dream with the smell of horse blankets.
Hans van de Waarsenburg (Helmond 1943) published his first collection of poems, entitled Gedichten (Poems), in 1965. His collection De vergrijzing (The graying) was awarded the prestigious Jan Campert Prize for Poetry in 1973. In March 2004 he received the first Municipal Award of the Helmond Town Council for his entire work.Between 1997 and 2000 he was chairman of the PEN Centre of the Netherlands. He was the founder of The Maastricht International Poetry Nights – a big biannual international poetry manifestation- and President of it from 1997 - 2013.
The above work is from a collection entitled The Past Is Never Dead and was reprinted with permission from Eyewear Publishing.
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The Past Is Never Dead
This book is now available for pre-order.