Life when you taste it,
It’s handsome and fatal,
A tall, dark stranger at every corner table,
Something whispered, a woman with a flower
On her shoulder, her nipples like living ice.
Life, certainly a romantic word,
When you taste it, Robin Hood, oak tree,
Dark-faced like a big river,
Laser lights before dying.
Life, a white napkin. But then dark, dangerous.
The taste of it.
A granite body with blood vessels,
Black meat and herbs.
Life as you live it. Carefully, leveling.
Taste life. It’s acorn water…
–Jarkko Laine
translated from the Finnish by SK