Fireflies

(Fireflies on the Water, installation with lights, mirrors,
and water at the Whitney Museum, 2002, by Yayoi Kusama,
born 1929, Japanese painter, performance artist, and creator
of installation art)

It’s my wedding anniversary today.

FIREFLIES

It was that evening with fireflies
while we were waiting for the bus to Velletri
that we saw two old people kissing
under the plane tree. It was then
you said, half to the air
half to me:
Whoever loves for years
hasn’t lived in vain.
And it was then I caught sight of the first
fireflies in the darkness, sparkling
with flashes of light around your head.
It was then.

~ Rolf Jacobsen (1907-1994), Norwegian poet