--Robert Walser (trans. Daniele Pantano)
One went here and the other
went there, and they hang,
fidget like leaves on a branch. Strange
how no one is happy anymore.
They all despair and say so openly,
as if it has been taken for granted
to no longer be sure of oneself.
The eyes watch and the ears listen
as usual, but the talent, the hope,
which is called genius, has been lost,
inside all of us lurks a kind of sorrow,
the lightness within us has become lifeless,
the difficult has become even more difficult.
It was different once. Today nobody is as
inconsolable as the happy ones used to be,
who worked hard to turn misfortune into fortune,
they fidget, tremble like leaves,
prisoners of their own indifference,
idly hanging on the branches.
No one has a single flaw anymore.
It is the flaws the flawless are missing.
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