overturned dream 

love is a scaffold where we sleep
whereas our sleep has a sight towards birds

don’t make yourself a cradle from a watered woman’s hair
a bird has built a nest in it
so it could die

you are to plant it the next day
and you will know
that you know nothing that you know
while reading on the bodies with your blinded hands

all you are left with is to tie the trees face down
so that the earth should mirror them when calling you
with a strange name





enlightened poem 

fear has sat down at the basis of the world to take a rest
above its head some ants were smashing seeds
one two
seven nine

but here is how from the right ear a religion has risen
bearing long legs
the middle worshippers would worship her
the left worshippers would worship her as well
even the worshipped ones would also worship her
and too much concord would have been there in the world
hadn’t it been

but there is how from the left ear rage was growing up from final
moods floods
wars
the right worshippers would worship them
even the worshipped ones would also worship them

you just hold me the candle so that I could write





open poem 

I closed

the doors windows waters gases lights cars walls houses days nights dreams wounds pits streets errors schools hospitals diseases factories churches governments planets frustrations anguishes phobias shades zippers words
so that I could laugh by myself

I took a man at random
from laughter did I take him
and threw him to the world
so that he should find out
that the evil there is
it’s not exactly
how it is



(translated into English by Nicoleta Crăete)

Romanian poet Nicoleta Crăete’s collection, The woman with a body of wax, won the Manuscript Section of The International Poetry Festival of Sighetu Marmației and was published in 2019 by Grinta Publishing House. It was also awarded the Book of the Year Prize at the Ion Cănăvoiu Literature Festival.

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