SONG 55

Sleep, my love, everything’s dozing off,

after some bedtime milk from the river.

The alarm clock’s face,

overgrown with dry reeds, is napping away.

Your cradle,

smiled good night

snowy-white,

now rocks in the wind,

hung from heaven on dreams.

I will weave your braids all through the night,

and lean over you, frost-covered, at morning,

ribbons bright and crimson.

Sleep my love,

in the house of reeds, a candle burns,

lit by me, the homeless one.

An ice floe above you, an ice floe below you.

Memories will thaw in its flame.

Translated by Mark Andryczyk with Andrij Kudla Wynnyckyj