Was I going to have thoughts also?
Was I going to be an insomniac like this?
Was I going to be quiet like this?
To stop caring for the tossed salad I loved so much?
Was I going to turn into this?
poetry
Sunday Evenings by Orhan Veli Kanik
I don’t look like much today;
When I pay my debts,
Possibly I’ll own a bunch of new suits;
Possibly you still won’t love me.
But, on Sunday evenings,
When I go by your neighborhood,
Dressed to kill,
Do you think I’ll cherish you
As much as I do today?
Because Of You by Nazim Hikmet
Because of you, each day is a melon slice
smelling sweetly of earth.
Because of you, all fruits reach out to me
as if I were the sun.
Thanks to you, I live on the honey of hope.
You are the reason my heart beats.
Because of you, even my loneliest nights
smile like an Anatolian kilim on your wall.
Should my journey end before I reach my city,
I’ve rested in a rose garden thanks to you.
Because of you I don’t let death enter,
clothed in the softest garments
and knocking on my door with songs
calling me to the greatest peace.
translated by Randy Blasing & Mutlu Konuk
Point by Pablo Neruda
There is no space wider than that of grief,
there is no universe like that which bleeds.
Loving You by Nazim Hikmet
Loving you is like eating bread dipped in salt,
like waking feverish at night
and putting my mouth to the water faucet,
like opening a heavy labeled parcel
eagerly, happily, cautiously.
Loving you is like flying over the sea
for the first time, like feeling dusk settle
softly over Istanbul.
Loving you is like saying “I’m alive.”
translated by Randy Blasing & Mutlu Konuk
Friendship: an Aztec poem
Like a quetzal plume, a fragrant flower,
friendship sparkles:
like heron plumes, it weaves itself into finery.
Our song is a bird calling out like a jingle:
how beautiful you make it sound!
Here, among flowers that enclose us,
among flowery boughs you are singing.
The Inlaid Harp by Li Shang-Yin
I wonder why my inlaid harp has fifty strings,
Each with its flower-like fret an interval of youth.
. . . The sage Chuang-tzu is day-dreaming, bewitched by butterflies,
The spring-heart of Emperor Wang is crying in a cuckoo,
Mermen weep their pearly tears down a moon-green sea,
Blue fields are breathing their jade to the sun. . .
And a moment that ought to have lasted for ever
Has come and gone before I knew.
translated by Witter Bynner & Kiang Kang-hu
Drinking Alone Beneath The Moon by Li Bei
A pot of wine among the flowers:
I drink alone, no kith or kin near.
I raise my cup to invite the moon to join me;
It and my shadow make a party of three.
Alas, the moon is unconcerned about drinking,
And my shadow merely follows me around.
Briefly I cavort with the moon and my shadow:
Pleasure must be sought while it is spring.
I sing and the moon goes back and forth,
I dance and my shadow falls at random.
While sober we seek pleasure in fellowship;
When drunk we go each our own way.
Then let us pledge a friendship without human ties
And meet again at the far end of the Milky Way.
LATER by Robert Creeley
If I could get
my hands on
a little bit
of it–neither fish,
flesh, nor fowl. Not
you, Harry. No one’s
mother–or father,
or children. Not
me again. Not
earth, sky, water–
no mind, no time.
No islands in the sun.
Money I don’t want.
No place more
than another–
I’m not here
by myself. But,
if you want to give
me something for Xmas,
I’ll be around.
Guardian Angel by Rolf Jacobsen
I am the bird that flutters against your window in the morning,
and your closest friend, whom you can never know,
blossoms that light up for the blind.
I am the glacier shining over the woods, so pale,
and heavy voices from the cathedral tower.
The thought that suddenly hits you in the middle of the day
and makes you feel so fantastically happy.
I am the one you have loved for many years.
I walk beside you all day and look intently at you
and put my mouth against your heart
though you’re not aware of it.
I am your third arm, and your second
shadow, the white one,
whom you cannot accept,
and who can never forget you.
translated by Robert Bly
Leonard Durso 