De gersmeander
De gersmeander sloech twaris ôf; op ’e knibbels
Fûn ik beknipe tsjin de messen in stikelbaarch,
Dea. Hy hie yn it lange gers sitten.
Ik hie him earder sjoen en sels ris iten jûn.
No hie ik syn ûnoptwingerige wrâld fernield,
Unwerstelber. Him begrave brocht gjin útkomst:
Ik stie de oare moarns op en hy net.
De earste dei nei in stjergefal is de nije absinsje
Altyd itselde; wy moatte foarsichtich
Mei elkoar wêze, freonlik wêze,
De tiid dy’t der noch is.
The Mower
The mower stalled, twice; kneeling, I found
A hedgehog jammed up against the blades,
Killed. It had been in the long grass.
I had seen it before, and even fed it, once.
Now I had mauled its unobtrusive world
Unmendably. Burial was no help:
Next morning I got up and it did not.
The first day after a death, the new absence
Is always the same; we should be careful
Of each other, we should be kind
While there is still time.
Ut Collected Poems, 2001. Skreaun yn 1979.