Oh, my love,
If you were at the level of my madness,
You would cast away your jewelry,
Sell all your bracelets,
And sleep in my eyes.
translated by Bassam K. Frangieh & Clementina R. Brown
Month: October 2022
from The Book of Love by Nizar Kabbani
Oh green bird,
As long as you are my love,
God is in the sky.
translaed by Bassam K. Frangieh & Clementina R. Brown
poem 55 by Nizar Kabbani
Why do you ask me to write you?
Why do you ask me
To undress in front of you
Like a primitive man?
Only writing undresses me.
When I speak
I keep my clothes on.
When I write
I become free and light
Like a weightless legendary bird.
When I write,
I separate from history
From the earth’s gravity,
I turn like a planet
In the space of your eyes.
translated by Bassam K. Frangieh & Clementina R. Brown
from Songs for a Woman: 4 by Yehuda Amichai
When you smile
serious ideas suddenly get drowsy
all night the mountains keep silent at your side—
at morning, the sand goes out with you, to sea
when you do nice things to me
all heavy industry shuts down.
translated by David Rosenberg
An Old Toolshed by Yehuda Amichai
What’s this? This is an old toolshed.
No, this is a great past love.
Anxiety and Joy were here together
in this darkness
and Hope.
Perhaps I’ve been here once before.
I didn’t go near to find out.
These are the voices calling out of a dream.
No, this is a great love.
No, this is an old toolshed.
translated by Yehuda Amichai & Ted Hughes
poem by Louis Simpson
As birds are fitted to the boughs
That blossom on the tree
And whisper when the south wind blows–
So was my love to me.
And still she blossoms in my mind
And whispers softly, though
The clouds are fitted to the wind,
The wind is to the snow.
from Firstly: xxvııı by Paul Eluard
Flushed woman in love
to take part in your pleasure
I color myself with pain.
I lived
you close your eyes
you enclose yourself in me
to accept life.
Everything that repeats itself is incomprehensible
you are born in a mirror
before my ancient image.
translated by Stuart Kendall
from Two Quatrains: 2 by Tu Fu
Birds the more white, against green stream
Blooms burst to flame, against blue hills
I glance, the spring is gone again.
What day, what day, can I go home?
Translated by Jerome P. Seaton
poem by Han Shan
Man lives his life in a dust bowl,
Just like vermin in the middle of the pot:
All day going round and round,
Never getting out from the inside.
Blessedness is not our lot:
Only nettlesomeness without end.
Time is like a flowing river—
One day, we wake up old men.
translated by Eugene Eoyang
from dreaming of Li Po, Two Poems: from 1 by Tu Fu
Old friend, you appeared in a dream,
It shows you have long been in my thoughts.
Perhaps it wasn’t your living soul:
The way’s too far, it couldn’t be done.
Your spirit came: and the maples were green:
Your spirit left: the mountain pass darkened.
Friend, now that you’re ensnared down there,
How did you manage to wing away?
Moonlight shines full on the rafters,
Yet I wonder if it isn’t your reflection.
The waters are deep, the waves expansive:
Don’t let the water dragon get you!
translated by Eugene Eoyang
Leonard Durso 