Turbulent Meditation

A storm makes the mill blades go around wildly
in the dark of night, grinding nothing. –You
            are kept awake by the same laws.
The gray shark’s belly is your weak lamp.

Diffused memories fall to the ocean’s depths
and solidify there into foreign residue. –Green
            with algae is your crutch. Those who
wander out to sea come back stiffened.

By Tomas Tranströmer
translated, from the Swedish, by Meagen Youngdahl

 
Meagen Youngdahl is an undergraduate student in Film and English at the University of California, Berkeley. Tomas Tranströmer (1931-) is widely regarded as one of the most influential Swedish poets of the 20th century. He is the recipient of the 2011 Nobel Prize for Literature.