incandescens | there will be no other end of the world

Another nice quiet day.

Phoned parents for regular catch-up. Apparently it is also cold and grey in Southampton. We are all depressed and waiting for spring to get here, while the early blossom goes brown on the cherry tree branches.

I have Dorval playing on iTunes (French singer). The words sort of slip past without me paying any attention except for the occasional phrase, but it just provides a nice melancholy background.

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A Song on the End of the World

On the day the world ends
A bee circles a clover,
A fisherman mends a glimmering net.
Happy porpoises jump in the sea,
By the rainspout young sparrows are playing
And the snake is gold-skinned as it should always be.

On the day the world ends
Women walk through the fields under their umbrellas,
A drunkard grows sleepy at the edge of a lawn,
Vegetable peddlers shout in the street
And a yellow-sailed boat comes nearer the island,
The voice of a violin lasts in the air
And leads into a starry night.

And those who expected lightning and thunder
Are disappointed.
And those who expected signs and archangels' trumps
Do not believe it is happening now.
As long as the sun and the moon are above,
As long as the bumblebee visits a rose,
As long as rosy infants are born
No one believes it is happening now.

Only a white-haired old man, who would be a prophet
Yet is not a prophet, for he's much too busy,
Repeats while he binds his tomatoes:
There will be no other end of the world,
There will be no other end of the world.

-- Czeslaw Milosz (uncertain of translator)