Daily Poem: The Catacombs in San Callisto ~ Rolf Jacobsen
The Catacombs in San Callisto
~ Rolf Jacobsen
Translated from the Norwegian by Roger Greenwald
A city in death with the streets caved in and the traffic lights still.
A city seen in a broken mirror we have to rub the darkness from with our hands.
Beneath the stars and the beneath the earth, a city like a laugh behind a closed door.
A Venice of night, bridges reflected in dust.
The world’s pride, a city with its forehead split and its face overgrown with slime.
Thin shreds of roots like fingers and feet, hands and shoulder blades of skeletons.
Roots and branches of roots, daed that bend their fingers around the dark as around a stone.
A tree up from our broken reality, with its root planted in humiliation.
A tree that stretches out over the earth and reaches almost to the stars, Arcturus, Capella.
A tree from the earth’s heart. Wondrous. Keeping faith.
Tree Roots from The Tree Center Dot Com
