'BEFORE THE END

Before the end everything
falls into delirium.
Remembrance rouses the eyelids
in combat with heavy sleep.
You had hands and arms of wood
up to the breast, which was of gold.
You walk wordless on streets filled
with antennae of monsters.
You were revolted by the skein of worms
writhing one above the other,
killed by every innocent glance.

Tonight before you journey
let the wings of angels fall
from your shoulders to earth;
their substance is required for other things.'

Martin Camaj, Selected Poetry (tr. from the Albanian by Leonard Fox, 1990)