Mihaela ALBU
Snow over Manhattan
To Aurora Cornu
1.
How is it that I had never thought
I would see Aurora 's metaphor,
In all its literal splendor,
On the streets of Manhattan :
‘Chrysanthemums, like rags of snow?'
And there it was, the chrysanthemum,
White petals covered by snow.
Unreal, fragile, and surprised.
The flower received the snow.
And the snow danced,
Under the sky of Manhattan ,
Going higher and higher,
Higher than Empire State
Or the Chrysler building,
Higher than any other building
Of this sky-scraper city.
They had scraped high heaven, all right,
This world and that;
And were going to cover
Everything in their white rags
The people, the streets, and the cars.
The snow danced its waltz,
Tumbled and rose,
The dancing flakes, unafraid,
Scorned the poor flower--
their kin--now afraid
of this unexpected white shower.
Only now, subdued, under snow
The white and rag-like flower understood--
Its stem shivering with surprise--
That there is, in this world,
Another kind of purity,
And that to be pure is cold.
Snow over Manhattan
2.
I could never stop wandering
At the colorful miracle we call
A rose!
Even if it grows in a little bush,
Stuck in a little pot, sitting on the balcony
Of a high rise
In Manhattan .
Its beauty breathes the freedom of large gardens.
That's what I was thinking yesterday,
A day in December,
When I was looking through the window,
Greedy for some trace of the summer.
The stem of the rose had grown
Unnaturally tall, in search of the light,
Hidden from it by the proud building next door.
But from the little soil in that little pot,
A thrill of seed growing had risen,
Through that long stem, to become a flower.
Innocently, it was waiting
For another ray of the sun;
Calmly, patiently,
Concerned only with its own color.
Not even when it started snowing--
For the first time that year--
Did it give up its candor;
Perhaps, not even then
Would this noble rose have understood
That the little cap of white floss,
Given to it in that season of gifts,
To cover its head as with moss,
So elegant and white,
Was death.
Traduceri de Anca ROSU
