Centre for Romanian Studies

Poetry in Translation (CLVII): Marin SORESCU (1936 – 1996, Romania) – “Menu”, “Meniu”

Menu

For breakfast a thin buttered slice
Of life.
With it we take water which rises incessantly
(Last night it covered three-quarters of the globe}
And boil it sterile of microbes.

For lunch we eat well and substantially
Three courses of earth:
Black earth, loess and clay.

We don’t usually have a cooked dinner.
We take
Either a star with a bit of honey
Or if it isn’t finished
Some happiness (which in fact we keep
For Sundays)
And whatever else is left over.

(Rendered in English by Constantin ROMAN, London,
© 2012, Copyright Constantin ROMAN)

First published in:
Encounter, December 1972 –
“Three Poems by Marin Sorescu”
by Constantin Roman & Timothy J.L. Cribb. (Cambridge)