poetry

T’ao Ch’ien on his version of carpe diem

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The Way’s been in ruin a thousand
years. People all hoard their hearts

away: so busy scrambling for esteemed
position, they’d never touch wine.

But whatever makes living precious
occurs in this one life, and this

life never lasts. It’s startling,
sudden as lightning. These hundred

years offer all abundance: Take it!
What more could you make of yourself?

translated by David Hinton

New Corn by T’ao Ch’ien

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Swiftly the years, beyond recall.
Solemn the stillness of this fair morning.
I will clothe myself in spring-clothing
And visit the slopes of the Eastern Hill.
By the mountain-stream a mist hovers,
Hovers a moment, then scatters.
There comes a wind blowing from the south
That brushes the fields of new corn.

translated by Arthur Waley

Nocturne by Juan Ramon Jimenez

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. . .The ship, slow and swift at once, conquers the water
but not the sky.
The blue remains behind, opening into living silver,
and once more is in front.
Fixed, the mast sways, always returning
–like the hour hand turning in even numbers
on the clock face–
to the stars themselves,
hour after hour, black and green.
One’s body, dreaming, returns
to the country it’s from, coming from the world
it does not belong to. One’s soul remains and
continues, always, through its eternal domain.

translated by Dennis Maloney & Clark Zlotchew

With the Roses by Juan Ramon Jimenez

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No, this pleasant afternoon
I cannot stay inside;
this free afternoon
I must go out in the air.

Into the laughing air
opening through the trees,
thousands of loves,
profound and waving.

The roses wait for me
bathing their flesh.
Nothing can keep me here;
I will not stay inside!

translated by Dennis Maloney

To Beloved Old Age by Juan Ramon Jimenez

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If only your memory
of me were this blue May
sky, completely filled with
the pure stars of my acts!

If my acts were identical, like them: all pure,
clear, good, tranquil, just like the stars!

Below, I see your smile in dreams
–dreams of your memories of my life!–

translated by Dennis Maloney & Clark Zlotchew

Life by Juan Ramon Jimenez

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What I used to regard as a glory shut in my face,
was a door, opening
toward this clarity:
. . . . . . .Country without a name:

Nothing can destroy it,this road
of doors, opening, one after another,
always toward reality:
. . . . . . .Life without calculation!

translated by James Wright

from 90 North by Randall Jarrell

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I reached my North and it had meaning.
Here at the actual pole of my existence,
Where all that I have done is meaningless,
Where I die or live by accident alone–

Where, living or dying, I am still alone;
Here where North, the night, the berg of death
Crowd me out of the ignorant darkness,
I see at last that all the knowlwdge

I wrung from the darkness–that the darkness flung me–
Is worthless as ignorance: nothing comes from nothing,
The darkness from the darkness. Pain comes from the darkness
And we call it wisdom. It is pain.

The Boy Unable To Speak by Federico Garcia Lorca

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. .The small boy is looking for his voice.
(The King of the Crickets had it.)
The boy was looking
in a drop of water for his voice.

. .I don’t want the voice to speak with;
I will make a ring from it
that my silence will wear
on its little finger.

. .The small boy was looking
in a drop of water for his voice.

. .(Far away the captured voice
was getting dressed up like a cricket.)

translated by Robert Bly