Midday Summer Dream: 7

Yannis Ritsos

WE SLEPT when we weren't tired. We ate when we weren't hungry.

We kept time using the wristwatch given to us on our name day, forgetting the clock of the garden that always pointed to summer.

Now we want to place the wristwatch close to our pulse, checking the time when the hour hands of shadow begin to point across the golden green face of the lawn.

There's still time for us to cut some poppies so our hands won't grow old within the monasteries of books.


from Midday Summer Dream (1938) [Collected Poems: Alpha ---pg 344]