I came in any case, how could I have stayed away? The scent of lavender and jasmine. The wind-up here in the mountains the wind is always     blowing-comes from the place behind the mountain of Hope where the sun just set It's getting dark fast. Like a shadow you emerge from the twilight I see your body has aged. The shawl over your shoulder gleams pale blue in the light of stars     just lit I am struggling to be nothing but body. Massive. Solid You look at me. I am the childish young man you loved, the middle-aged man you left and now also the one you     look at like a stranger Your attendants trail their particolored veils in my breast. I look around     helplessly for the children Then you take hold of my left hand with your right and set your right foot on my left foot I am not Joachim and you are not Anna, but your rib cage heaves like hers and mine rises like his Then you turn around, and then I do Laughing you walk away from me. Your bare feet against the stones. The cicadas. The     darkness. The lavender I go. I stamp. I scream. I laugh And your ladies depart my breast waving in their delightfully raw, high-heeled,     satyrically reeling parade Magnus William-Olsson Translated from the Swedish by Rika Lesser This work is the author's work; it appears here with the permission of the author. We would like to remind our readers that it is a violation of copyright law to distribute this or any other poem appearing on the website without the express permission of the author.