How pleasant, oh dear God, how pleasant
To journey on the blue sea
To cast off from shore
Aimless as thought.

I would set sail to the wind
And wander from sea to sea
To find myself one morning
In some deserted bay.

In a harbor large and clean
A harbor in coral isles
Where in the wake of clouds
A golden summer trails.

The languid scent of oleasters
Would fill me there
And the taste of sorrow
Never find that place.

Sparrows would nest in the flowered
Eaves of my dream castle
The evenings would unravel with colors
The days pass in pomengrate gardens.

translated by Ozcan Yalim, William Fielder, and Dionis Coffin Riggs

there are words
inadequate
actions
incomprehensible
feelings
misunderstood
some things are best
left alone
to wither
on their own accord
where blossoms
are impossible
to cultivate

My Lord granted me such a heart,
At once, it began to adore.
Now, one moment it basks in joy;
Next moment its tears start to pour.

One moment it seems like a bird
In the dead of winter, stranded.
Next moment it revels: gardens
And orchards are born at its core.

One moment it becomes tongue-tied
And leaves all things unclarified.
Next moment, pearls spill from its mouth:
To those who suffer, it gives cure.

One moment it soars to heaven–
It descends into the earth, then.
One moment it seems like a drop,
Then like the ocean whose waves roar.

translated by Talat S. Halman

Love is the water of eternal life, cures every woe;
Gardens where lovers reunite drive away all sorrow.
They say there is a window that opens from heart to heart;
If there are no walls, there is no need for any window.

translated by Talat S. Halman

The person we love
Is the shadow
Of our face
In the future

translated by Talat S. Halman

To love
Is
To double
The world

translated by Talat S. Halman

Moses’s feelings were strenuous but not sad and he did not remember the skimming fleet at the ten-minute signal before a race or the ruined orchards where he hunted grouse or Parson’s Pond and the cannon on the green and the water of the river shining between the hardware store and the five-and-ten-cent store where Cousin Justina had once played the piano. We are all inured, by now, to those poetic catalogues where the orchid and the overshoe appear cheek by jowl; where the filthy smell of old plumage mingles with the smell of the sea. We have all parted from simple places by train or boat at season’s end with generations of yellow leaves spilling on the north wind as we spill our seed and the dogs and the children in the back of the car, but it is not a fact that at the moment of separation a…

Drinking at Eastern Slope by night,
I sober, then get drunk again.
When I come back, it’s near midnight.
I hear the thunder of my houseboy’s snore,
I knock but no one answers at my door.
What can I do but, leaning on my cane,
Listen to the river’s refrain?

I long regret I am not master of my own.
When can I just ignore the hums of up and down?
In the still night the soft winds quiver
On the ripples of the river.
From now on, I would vanish with my little boat,
For the rest of my life, on the sea I would float.

translated by Xu Yuan-zhong