Ivan Dobnik - Vilenica

the merman
for Robin Robertson
before husum, with the first catch
they pulled me on board, the obulos
of a shell in my hand as cold as halibut,
the herring and their silver applause
surrounding me on deck. their hot grog
burnt me down to the fish ribs.
i got used to other things: the clock
and its bells. snow. to feather beds.
they found the yokel, the jealous one,
drowned in a puddle. a seed
arose. one morning when the cod
lay rotting at my door, i took that as a sign.
i left behind the angst of the sleeping,
who fear water in their dreams, my prints
licked away by the sun, and I left the gaping
neighbors, the mothers and their prams,
their sons with fish lips and webs.
unhurried i sank back down to the palace,
its walls of flounder eyes, where my wife
grinds salt for the sea. i became my own myth.
Jan Wagner · 317
Translated by David Keplinger
and Katharina Norden, with the author