Once I read a story
about a grasshopper one day old,
a green adventurer who at dusk
was swallowed up by a bat.
Right after this the wise old owl
gave a short consolation speech:
Bats also have the right to make a living,
and there are many grasshoppers still left.
Right after this came
the end: an empty page.
Forty years now have gone by.
Still leaning above that empty page,
I do not have the strength
to close the book.