Pigeons

All of a sudden, I close my right fist tightly and pound it on my left
palm. “Pow!” How empty the wilderness is! Yet in the morbid sky
a flock of pigeons flies by: are they in couples or singles?

With my left hand I hold my loosening right fist, whose fingers
slowly stretch yet, unable to go all the way, can only turn around
and around in my palm. Ah, you innocent hands that have worked
but are to keep on working, have killed but are to be killed in the
end, how you resemble a pair of wounded birds. Yet in the dizzy
sky a flock of pigeons flies by: are they in couples or singles?

Now I use my left hand to caress my trembling right hand gently,
but the left hand trembles too, making it look even more like a
woman pitying her wounded partner, a grief-stricken bird. So I use
my right hand to caress my left hand gently . . . perhaps those flying
in the sky are hawks.

In the anaemic sky, not a single bird. Innocent hands tremble from
leaning on each other, hands that have worked but are to keep on
working, have killed but are to be killed in the end, let me raise
you up high, how I wish to release you—like releasing a pair of
healed birds—from my arms!

PIGEONS