Esa Mäkijärvi

Two Poems

I’ve seen the roses stripped

I’ve seen the roses stripped; their beauty is not the same
from the below as from the top,

their lukewarm red has mortality in it
and the two sides of the rose live in between two eternities

ever fearing which side triumphs,
the red veins full of moving or stopped blood,

the opening of roses is like heavens; they give their unbelievable
beauty and then stop.



A Light

If the light goes out there will be no more light
but maybe that is just what makes a ligh-
t so

(the cold poetry that climbs the thigh)

and precisely at that moment the mystery of ligh-
t begins to solve itself when a man looks
at the end of his hand and counts his fingers.

return to SHAMPOO 36