THE TOAST

Let's get ready,
Brothers, we are
United in blood and flesh:
Let's raise our cups now,
This wine is ours,
Let's drink a toast to the whirlwind dance!
This world is damned,
Ensnared in our secret
And knows no way out of it;
It can never guess
The familiar images
Which our alliance gives it.

"Are they left, are they right?"
Is their furious guesswork,
But they know not why and what
In our lives drives us
To death, which does not fade;
Nor when we will meet our end.

So, brothers,
Let's just kiss
And raise our cups above the tablecloth:
In brotherhood we stand strong,
Devoted to the secret,
Free in life
And death.

Ljubljana, 1987