An Rud is Suaraí

Le Séamas Ó Neachtain

Tá leac ghlas ann

Ar thaobh an bhóthair

Os comhair clóis gan teach,

Trádstórais amháin ann,

Salachar sa tsráid.

Píosa den chosán is ea é,

San áit nach siúltar.

Tá gach foirgneamh sean,

Roinnt díobh tréigthe,

Roinnt eile ligthe i léig.

Tá pollta sa tsráid,

Féar agus cannaí beorach

Folmha, gloine briste,

Duairc faoi scamaill ghlasa;

Ní foláir duit an oíche a sheachaint.

Tháinig mé agus chonaic mé

An leac ghlas, atá níos sinne

Ná aon duine sna leoraithe,

San áit, sa chruth mar atá,

Rud nach bhfeictear le fios.

Is dócha go mbíonn trácht

na n-ainmhithe air, idir

Bheag agus mhór – francaigh

Mar chait nó madraí fiáine,

Ar an seanphíosa cosáin sráide.

Níl teach ann leis an seoladh sin

Mar a bhíodh céad bliain ó shin.

Níl éinne beo a shiúil feadh na sráide

Ar an gcosán gann. An rud is

Suaraí ar bhloc neamhshuntasach.

The Most Insignificant Thing

By James Norton

There's a gray slab there
On the side of the road
In front of a yard with no house,
Just warehouses there,
Filth in the street.

It's a piece of the sidewalk,
In a place no one walks.
Every building is old,
Some of them are abandoned,
Others gone to neglect.

There are holes in the street,
Grass and empty cans
Of beer, broken glass,
Dingy under a gray cloud;
You must avoid the night.

I came and I saw
The gray slab, which is older
Than anyone in the trucks
In the place, in the condition that it's in,
A thing no one sees knowingly.

I suppose there is traffic
Of the animals on it, both
Big and small - rats
Like cats or wild dogs,
On the old piece of sidewalk.

There is no house with that address
Like there used to be a hundred years ago.
No one is alive who walked down the street
On the sparse sidewalk. The most
Insignificant thing on an ordinary block.

Norton.