As if I had heard a swallow [1]
Friederika Mayröcker [2]
Translated by xia23
The unicorn says to the bicorn: it seemed to me, as if I had heard a swallow in the October air, it twittered so airily.
The bicorn says to the tricorn: it seemed to me, as if the unicorn had said to me that it had heard a swallow twittered in the air of the beautiful October. It twittered so airily in the beautiful air.
The tricorn says to quadracorn: it seemed to me, as if the bicorn had said to me that it had heard the unicorn had reported a wallow twittered in the middle of October, low on the roofs in the beautiful air.
The quadracorn says to the quintacorn, it seems to me, as if I had repeatedly heard the tricorn had reported, that it had been brought by the bicorn, namely, that the unicorn had heard the swallow, flat over the roofs in the beautiful air of the beautiful October, it also twittered so airily.
The quintacorn says to the multicorn (these corns can hardly be held, people fought hard to hold if they look, it seemed to me, it were then, people sat attentively in front of the orchestra playing smoothly, in which such a multicorn blew): it was as if I were, as if something had twittered to me – have you heard it too? It was in the beautiful air of the beautiful October, flat over the roofs and even made the tv master tremble a bit, it was a twittering in the air, in the beautiful dove-grey air of the dove-gray October.
The multicorn says to the unicorn: I must have really been at the orchestra rehearsal this morning when the mist fell and I felt once more like in spring and heard swallows twittered.
[1]. p. 77. Als hätte ich eine Schwalbe gehört. Kontakt mit der Zeit. Dieter Stöpfgeshoff. Max Hueber Verlag. Germany, 1995.
[2]. Friederika Mayröcker. 12/20/1924 – 6/4/2021. An Austrian writer.
