"the stone dancing / changes its dust to music"

(excerpt)

by Nelly Sachstranslated by Ruth and Matthew Mead

But perhaps
we
smoky with error
have still created a wandering universe
with the language of breath?

Again and again the fanfare
of beginning blown
the grain of sand coined at full speed
before it grew light again
above the embryo’s
bud of birth?

But who knows
the degrees of making fertile
and how the green corn is bent
from soils eaten away
for the sucking mouths
of light.

In the blue distance
where the red row of apple trees wanders
—rooted feet climbing the sky—
the longing is distilled
for all those who live in the valley.

The sun, lying by the roadside,
with magic wands,
commands the travelers to halt.

They stand still
in the glassy nightmare
while the cricket scratches softly
at the invisible

and the stone dancing
changes its dust to music.

From Nelly Sachs: Collected Poems, translated from German by Ruth and Matthew Mead. Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 1988.

Art: Gold leaf, Minoan ca. 2300–2100 BCE, public domain, and Terracotta One Handled Cup, Minoan, ca. 1600–1450 BCE, public domain.

When has the sun commanded you to halt?

Take 5 minutes to write, right now. Don’t make anything tidy.