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Leaf
It tore itself from the branch, slowly and unobserved,
and stayed there in the air, hovering.
Thinking it a yellow butterfly, the child
reached out her hand to grasp it.
And there was no change in the autumn rainbow,
not by the slightest hue.
Only the branch held on to its secret sorrow,
grieving for the green.
Aco Šopov, Merge with the Silence, 1955
Translated from the Macedonian by Christina E. Kramer and Rawley Grau, The Long Coming of the Fire, Dallas, Deep Vellum, 2023.
„Leaf“, by Macedonian painter Zoran Jakimovski
