Man Cursing the Sea (Holub)

Watch Hill, R.I. (August 2013)

Someone
just climbed to the top of the cliff
and started cursing the sea:

New Dorp, Staten Island (May 2013)

Stupid water, stupid pregnant water,
slimy copy of the sky,
hesitant hoverer between the sun and the moon,
pettifogging reckoner of shells,
fluid, loud-mouthed bull,
fertilizing the rocks with his blood,
suicidal sword
splintering itself on any promontory,
hydra, fragmenting the night,
breathing salty clouds of silence,
spreading jelly-like wings
in vain, in vain,
gorgon, devouring its own body,

water, you absurd flat skull of water—

Weekapaug, R.I. (Oct. 2010)

Thus for a while he cursed the sea,
which licked his footprints in the sand
like a wounded dog.

And then he came down
and stroked
the small immense stormy mirror of the sea.

There you are, water, he said,
and went his way.

-Miroslav Holub (tr. Ian Milner & George Theiner)