101 Poems, Number 42

Favorite Poems Throughout My Life

42: “The Half-Finished Heaven,” 2001, by Tomas Tranströmer (1931-2015)*

I heard this poem on TV**—

It right away appealed to me.

I found it right away, online,

And memorized it, line by line.

I mumble it throughout the week—

Some passers-by think, “What a freak!”

But now those lines are in my head,

Where they will stay till I am … [you know what rhymes here].

It deals with heaven—incomplete.

It’s being finished—quite a feat.

But beauty’s there (unfinished state).

I love these lines—superbly great.

Link to poem. 

*Nobel Prize in Literature, 2011; he was a Swedish writer

**an episode of Wallander with Kenneth Branagh—the final one: June 5, 2016