Transtromer

So I recently wrote a review of the new New Directions book of Tomas Tranströmer's collected poems. I'm not sure they'll publish it because I had way too much to say and it ended up being 8 pages. Anyway, as part of the review I translated a part of a poem Tranströmer wrote in high school (in the journal Medan Lagrarna Gro, 1949) that was not included in the New Directions book. And since Mike likes Tranströmer and may not have read this poem, I thought I would post a translation here:


a fog trembles with its fingers over
the churchyard
the carriage wheels stop in front of a
overgrown grave

the man crouches down and listens: he has
a sailor’s face
and the flowers that are laid on the ground are as
withered