Lyubomir Nikolov: Three Poems

Clouds


White clouds drift by
full of steam and mud.
Where have we come from?
Who made us?

Forgotten, I lie in the grass
chewing a stalk of mugwort.
We’ve fallen with the dew.
With the dew we’ll fade away.




Fish


She lies nude on the bed
and smiles.

I bring fish from the tub
and scatter them on the sheets.

They look at me with round, unblinking eyes,
ashamed of their nakedness.

I cover them with orange peel.




The Rose


The wind gently rocks it.
A beetle crawls inside
not to get the sweet pollen
but just to swing for a while.




From Unreal Estate
Translated from the Bulgarian by Miroslav Nikolov