The Balloon Travelers by Lars Gustafsson

Look at the tall man over there in the top hat.
He is leaning out observing westward.
It is early in the morning, echoing light.

The town is awaiting in the distance with its bells
The peaks of the towers cast blue shadows innocently
It is completely calm, the moment before departure.

From nearby the balloon is huge, like a giant pumpkin
it is shining and growing, it is multicolored.
And the murmur from the spectators, a swarm of bumblebees,

They are cheering and waving at the travelers in the basket,
who pretend not to notice and keep silent about their destination.
They are immovable and ready to depart.

The man in the top hat is still observing,
and he raises the spyglass of shining brass
as if he were looking for clouds or something invisible.

When they rise they will diminish to a point
until they reach the highest air strata and snow,
the whitish snow cooling and dazzling

will fill the air they breathe, touch their foreheads.
In autumn you can see it fall as frost
the heights' breath fumbling over the fields,

and some autumn when the frost falls early
you will suddenly remember them and their trip
and how they still are climbing, as in dizziness higher

through a thinner air then that of winters
with a tone like that of splintering glass
from deep forests of frailest rain.

And how they rise higher and higher through the years
till memory itself is singing frail as glass,
-and it is unbearable, forget me, believe something else:

a pleasure trip, an adventure for connoisseurs!
A gentleman there in light cutaway with bright-blue vest
gives a slow signal with a gloved gesture.

It is free and already it rises,
imperceptible the cheering sinks below.