I still wore a little child’s clothes, and I lay
Stretched out with my mother in the warm heather,
The clouds floated by above us
And my mother asked me what I saw in them.
I called out: Scandinavia, and: ducks,
There goes a lady, sheep with a herder-
The wonders became words and pushed further,
But I saw how my mother’s smile filled with tears…
Then came the time that I didn’t look up to the sky,
Even though the heavens were full of clouds,
I didn’t reach to the flight of the strange thing
That with my shadow rubbed along side my life.
-Now my little boy lies aside me in the heather
And shows me what he sees in the clouds,
Now I cry myself, and see in that which is to come
The distant clouds which caused my mother to cry-
(Martinus Nijhoff)
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- The End (Martinus Nijhoff Poems)
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Based on Topics: Life Poems, Time PoemsBased on Keywords: herder, scandinavia