NERUDA

If only you would touch my heart,

if only you were to put your mouth to my heart,

your delicate mouth, your teeth,

if you were to put your tongue like a red arrow

there where my dusty heart is beating,

if you were to blow on my heart near the sea, weeping,

it would make a dark noise, like the drowsy sound of train wheels,

like the indecision of waters,

like autumn in full leaf,

like blood,

I Heard Someone Say

I heard someone say there exists

in the water a stone and a ring

and over the water a word

that lay the ring over the stone.

I saw my poplar go down to the water,

I saw how her arm reached down to the deep,

saw her roots pleading upward toward heaven for night.

I did not hurry after her,

I only picked up from the earth that crumb

that has the shape and loft of your your eyes,

I took from your throat the chain of remarks,

which I laid round the table on which the crumb lay,

And saw my poplar no more.

PAUL CELAN