Author: Christoph Wenzel
Translator: Richard Martin

                                           for Malte

SPRING’S a time like an accusation
last year’s bad conscience

carried over from then: an overdrawn winter
account and unsolved equations

not yet fully grown: the year breaking out
flexes itself with weak thunderstorms

a spaciousness outside a disturbance
of the air: grass pollen wetness and a gulping

beneath the loosened scarves: tinged with
unsaturated remains of swath and aftermath

the forecast’s current patterns
promise fluid transitions

climate and change in contrast
the tertian fever of short summers

and a last frost in april
is of quite a different nature

Original © Christoph Wenzel,
from Jahrbuch der Lyrik
(S. Fischer Verlag, Frankfurt am Main, 2007),
to appear in Wenzel’s forthcoming collection
(Yedermann Verlag, 2009)
All rights reserved
Translation © Richard Martin