The sky is dark … An atmosphere of mourning!
The bells of Tregrom 10 are sounding the knell of the dead…
…………………………..
In passing over Pont-Kozh I am standing
Before a painful tableau like the Picture of Despair!
The water is dark and low and dead;
For it’s locked over there, behind the mound
The big dam of Kernaskireg.
Coming, from the fold of Keravel forest,
Straight to the old mill of Kernoterioù
Is the Leger descending on her plain
Like a wide black velvet ribbon,
Between the long meadows cropped short
Under the guard of the tall half-bare poplars
And conveying slowly, slowly,
Clusters of brown and yellow leaves.
…………………………..
At the far end of the Bridge is the log
So calm, so motionless!
On it are collected little boats of leaves
Like a seaful of souls!
Waiting for nights to cross the sluice-gate
With plaintive cries
Like the humming of the wind right now,
on the night of All Saints’ Day.
March 1963.
10 The nearby village.
Translated by Lenora Timm
This poem in breton
