Cows come from the sea...
Cows come from the sea on this morning at the beginning of time blue-green cows udders full of salty sea milk and the Sea Mother drives them ashore with a switch of sea-grass
Sea Maidens come keep the cows and keep yourselves from lecherous herders by night In autumn may a hundred blue-green cows be back here in the bay between mottled stones May their horns glisten in the mist and may your eyes sparkle But keep your hearts clear and cool like the morning dew
You will never get used to the life of human women it puts fetters on the heart dreams are never fulfilled and feelings only give rise to grief People are beautiful but cruel They keep to their kin like insects they gather the gold of dreams by night squander it all away in the morning
To become someone’s own means being dangerously close to a human star
But your eyes are like the sea of the world stars drown in it
Sea Maidens come keep the cows But keep your hearts clear and cool like the morning dew
-Kristiina Ehin. Modern Poetry in Translation. Series 3. No. 13. Tr. Ilmar Lehtpere. [See her short story ‘Patterns’ on Electric Literature, and her book of poems The Drums of Silence also translated by Lehtpere and published by The Oleander Press (Cambridge) in 2007... Ehin makes music...]









