Bzzlletin. Jaargang 4

[p. 46]

Kjell Erik Vindtorn
Nothing surprises us any more
English Translation by Barbara Bird

1

not what's all the rage in the fashion mag for plants

where the raspberry-bushes steal back into the seed

because there really is so much that is possible

if everyone would only smear patience all over themselves/

patience so we don't have to stare dazedly through

all the walls of compulsion/for many find the

requirements high and for others it's incomprehensibly easy/

enough is enough cry the sour-people shaking the book-tree

so the literature of all hell breaks loose over the cities

like snowflakes and coloured drops of corruption/

right here where everything's a welcome change..

for nothing surprises us any more/not even

disorganised thoughts which with problems and with passion-constipation

make love to the traffic-lights openly..

so the fire-alarm pours out of everyone's eyes/

2

persist cry the women crawling round in their sour

apple and dreaming of a sexual cease-fire..

you heart-attacks for us placid road-users on

route 1975 where the cars rape one another daily

from the front and to hell with a thousand rules/

for nothing surprises us any more/not the flowers

unfolding on an island in the middle of the field

or the black bread growing wild this year..

and everything's gone too far in our opinion

but we don't do anything about it except tighten

our frayed patience and from time to time unsurprised

constantly stare hard at the cars contrapuntally

as they feed on the open road or throw more food in the plastic bowl/

3

for nothing frightens us any more..

and anxiety isn't all allowed into this area of

the film which is the only real thing in the rush for contact

with market-value and no warmth anywhere in the body

our eternal testing the tenderness of meat while words flow

out of our mounths and turn into blood.,

now and then all the time we try to interpret, radio-signals

which whisper soporifically in our defence..

now and then the smile is wiped off our faces when society

crushes more of our powers of resistance/

but at night as the noise staggers aimlessly through the towns..

the rows of houses digest their furniture..

and the darkness leafs through our dreams/there is nothing

that sleeps less than this