This poem is taken from PN Review 283, Volume 51 Number 5, May - June 2025.

Five Poems
translated by John Gallas

Maria Banus
(1914–1999)


March Wind

There’s a mad March wind in the turn of the world:
Today it has taken its turn with me.
I believe in the apples, round and ripe,
That will figure its pause and pregnancy.

The whole earth shakes. It shakes with life.
The March wind tumbles the turning sky.
We believe in the drive of newmade thoughts,
The startled now, and the scoured I.

The March wind howls in the turning world:
Believe in your strength. The trees are bare.
Invisible turbulence beats the branches.
Infinite darkness fills the air.


So we mend...

So we mend, sublime and slow, like pines,
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