Electric Verses

Etusivu : Welcome to Electric Verses! : Pentti Holappa

Pentti Holappa

Insomnia

I can bear the grey days all right. The sky´s
lowering — that I know from old; and, yes,
the trek to those I love stretches as far as Oceania,
the starlit domes, the rainbow´s end, or youth;
but, like stripping a coat from one dying of cold,
or depriving a drowning man of a life-raft,
the insomniacs have been robbed
of the magic key to the gloomy castle
whose turrets let you see the whole globe,
though it´s dark and our planet´s swimming
in cries of pain. A long, long time ago
a cool hand fell on my brow. Someone said: `Sleep!´
There was someone.

From Älä pelkää, 1997. Transl. Herbert Lomas.

  • Insomnia
  • Don’t be afraid
  • Key
  • Crow
  • Bulldog
  • Shopping expedition
  • An angel’s hand
  • 25 October
  • The long train
  • The sick and the healer
  • Absence
  • Either/Or
  • Torch
  • The boarding house dog
  • The train to despair
  • The poet François Villon…