Natalie,
Once in a hundred, in ten,
or seven years,
the country stream is tearing down the bridges before my eyes,
as a girl takes off her bracelets in front of the mirror.
And watches the pupils of horror dilate.
At least once a week,
and I come out as a different person
I cross the same river
I wake up
and a young natural waterfall,
with a deep and guttural voice – to scare the fish.
And I try to stay whole
on its other shore,
bristling like a hungry dragon.
I use imagination clouds,
to make it rain
and I grow up
to scare the bridges –
white metaphors,
holding me over the scree,
still alive.
Then someone comes and steals
my green apples
moreover, my roses have not yet bloomed.
*
You drink so beautifully, he says,
that your life will crumble
absurdly caught in that thin glass.
Roza Boyanova
Translated by Dessy Tsvetkova
Picture Nick Victor