Poetry translations

Here are my first translations of some of Martin Auer's poems. More to follow soon. A couple of links for German speakers:

http://www.myspace.com/Martinauer

http://www.martinauer.net/

And completely without a word

And completely: without a word, you know?
As if you’d suddenly been blinded and just hadn’t noticed it
because you were still asleep.
Or drowned all of a sudden in your own dress
Yes: as if you had a dress made of water
and your head was stuck inside it, you know?
you couldn’t get your eyes over the collar.
Or as if — but that’s going too far, nobody would understand —
as if a rose made of air was growing on you
somewhere on your shoulder, but nobody knew,
only your jacket would never sit quite right
because of the rose.
Or as if — listen! — as if you’d already said every word
and there weren’t any more left, you know?
no more words you could say
and the whole dictionary
was empty.

Quiet waters sing

Quiet waters sing,
sing far away, behind the clatter,
behind the noise and the chatter,
quiet waters sing.

Quiet waters sing,
far away behind crying and moaning,
audible still through wailing and groaning,
quiet waters sing.

Quiet waters sing,
behind the laughter and the flurry,
far away, through cold, through death and hurry,
you hear quiet waters.