Agnes’ song by Lee Chang-dong

How is it over there?
How lonely is it?
Is it still glowing red at sunset?
Are the birds still singing on the way to the forest?
Can you receive the letter I dared not send?
Can I convey…
the confession I dared not make?
Will time pass and roses fade?
Now it’s time to say goodbye
Like the wind that lingers and then goes,
just like shadows
To promises that never came,
to the love sealed till the end.

To the grass kissing my weary ankles
And to the tiny footsteps following me
It’s time to say goodbye
Now as darkness falls
Will a candle be lit again?
Here I pray…
nobody shall cry…
and for you to know…
how deeply I loved you
The long wait in the middle of a hot summer day
An old path resembling my father’s face
Even the lonesome wild flower shyly turning away
How deeply I loved
How my heart fluttered at hearing faint song
I bless you
Before crossing the black river
With my soul’s last breath
I am beginning to dream…
a bright sunny morning…
again I awake blinded by the light…
and meet you…
standing by me.

Note: This poem is originally in Korean. If you have the original version, please leave a comment. Also, I’m not sure if Lee Chang-dong wrote the poem, if you can confirm, please let me know.

maggie and milly and molly and may by E. E. Cummings

maggie and milly and molly and may
went down to the beach(to play one day)

and maggie discovered a shell that sang
so sweetly she couldn’t remember her troubles,and

milly befriended a stranded star
whose rays five languid fingers were;

and molly was chased by a horrible thing
which raced sideways while blowing bubbles:and

may came home with a smooth round stone
as small as a world and as large as alone.

For whatever we lose(like a you or a me)
it’s always ourselves we find in the sea

Must Escape by Farzaneh Khojandi

At last the word for scream bursts into my notebook.
Damn this sick society
where shadows boast about their own size.
No one understands the absence of the sun.
No one knows that this brightness
is just pretending to be dawn.
No one understands the absence of meaning
in the guises of the chameleon.
These hollow ghosts
with their gorgeous clothes
and dazzling pendants on long chains,
and breadth perfumed with the scent of Europe -
from the pulpit of time, with fancy words
they talk deceit as if it were truth.
I am offended by them, offended
by the pretentiousness of the very small.
I am offended by myself, too:
I just don’t understand enough
about the weakness of form and the courage of meaning.
Why do I make conversation with nothing
and stitch my words into the hems of the mediocre
like margin prayers or footnotes.
Must escape
must run away to simplicity,
must elevate the best,
must become another example of the sun.
O darling, what can I say, for even you,
choose a dim light-bulb over daylight,
even you with your perceptive glance,
no longer see the absence of the sun.

Note: Above English translation from the original by Jo Shapcott. Following is the original.

After Midnight (तीसरा पहर) by Mohan Rana

I saw the stars far off -
as far as I from them:
in this moment I saw them -
in moments of the twinkling past.
In the boundless depths of darkness,
these hours
hunt the morning through the night.

And I can’t make up my mind:
am I living this life for the first time?
Or repeating it, forgetting as I live
the first moment of breath every time?

Does the fish too drink water?
Does the sun feel the heat?
Does the light see the dark?
Does the rain too get wet?
Do dreams ask questions about sleep as I do?

I walked a long, long way
and when I saw, I saw the stars close by.
Today it rained all day long and the words were washed away
from your face.

Note: Translated from the Hindi by Bernard O’Donoghue. Following is the original.

मैंने तारों को देखा बहुत दूर
जितना मैं उनसे
वे दिखे इस पल में
टिमटिमाते अतीत के पल
अँधेरे की असीमता में,
सुबह का पीछा करती रात में
यह तीसरा पहर

और मैं तय नहीं कर पाता
क्या मैं जी रहा हूँ जीवन पहली बार,
या इसे भूलकर जीते हुए दोहराए जा रहा हूँ
सांस के पहले ही पल को हमेशा !

क्या मछली भी पानी पीती होगी
या सूरज को भी लगती होगी गरमी
क्या रोशनी को भी कभी दिखता होगा अँधकार
क्या बारिश भी हमेशा भीग जाती होगी,
मेरी तरह क्या सपने भी करते होंगे सवाल नींद के बारे में

दूर दूर बहुत दूर चला आया मैं
जब मैंने देखा तारों को – देखा बहुत पास,
आज बारिश होती रही दिनभर
और शब्द धुलते रहे तुम्हारे चेहरे से

Kept Apart by Saleem Saim

Here I think, and think of her,
All time as a mad,
There my, wife moans,
Tossing lone, and sad,

O exchange of rings!
Then two halves kept apart,
Now wait and wait,
For distant date, O restless heart!

Livelong nights, sleepless bed,
Visions and dreams haunt,
Her changing faces, nuptial fuss,
And unfulfilled want,

Life hastens days,
But thoughts make them go slow,
Flowers bloom, I care not,
Evenings come and go,

Here I think, and think of her,
All time as a mad,
There my, wife moans,
Tossing lone, and sad,

Tossing lone, and sad,
Tossing lone, and sad
Lone and sad, lone and sad,
Sad, sad, sad, sad…….

Sea Breeze, Bombay by Adil Jussawalla

Partition’s people stitched
Shrouds from a flag, gentlemen scissored Sind.
An opened people, fraying across the cut
country reknotted themselves on this island.

Surrogate city of banks,
Brokering and bays, refugees’ harbour and port,
Gatherer of ends whose brick beginnings work
Loose like a skin, spotting the coast,

Restore us to fire. New refugees,
Wearing blood-red wool in the worst heat,
come from Tibet, scanning the sea from the north,
Dazed, holes in their cracked feet.

Restore us to fire. Still,
Communities tear and re-form; and still, a breeze,
Cooling our garrulous evenings, investigates nothing,
Ruffles no tempers, uncovers no root,

And settles no one adrift of the mainland’s histories.

The Invitation by Oriah Mountain Dreamer

It doesn’t interest me
what you do for a living.
I want to know
what you ache for
and if you dare to dream
of meeting your heart’s longing.

It doesn’t interest me
how old you are.
I want to know
if you will risk
looking like a fool
for love
for your dream
for the adventure of being alive.

It doesn’t interest me
what planets are
squaring your moon…
I want to know
if you have touched
the centre of your own sorrow
if you have been opened
by life’s betrayals
or have become shrivelled and closed
from fear of further pain.

I want to know
if you can sit with pain
mine or your own
without moving to hide it
or fade it
or fix it.

I want to know
if you can be with joy
mine or your own
if you can dance with wildness
and let the ecstasy fill you
to the tips of your fingers and toes
without cautioning us
to be careful
to be realistic
to remember the limitations
of being human.

It doesn’t interest me
if the story you are telling me
is true.
I want to know if you can
disappoint another
to be true to yourself.
If you can bear
the accusation of betrayal
and not betray your own soul.
If you can be faithless
and therefore trustworthy.

I want to know if you can see Beauty
even when it is not pretty
every day.
And if you can source your own life
from its presence.

I want to know
if you can live with failure
yours and mine
and still stand at the edge of the lake
and shout to the silver of the full moon,
“Yes.”

It doesn’t interest me
to know where you live
or how much money you have.
I want to know if you can get up
after the night of grief and despair
weary and bruised to the bone
and do what needs to be done
to feed the children.

It doesn’t interest me
who you know
or how you came to be here.
I want to know if you will stand
in the centre of the fire
with me
and not shrink back.

It doesn’t interest me
where or what or with whom
you have studied.
I want to know
what sustains you
from the inside
when all else falls away.

I want to know
if you can be alone
with yourself
and if you truly like
the company you keep
in the empty moments.

Untitled by Rumi

The minute I heard my first love story
I started looking for you, not knowing
how blind that was.

Lovers don’t finally meet somewhere.
They’re in each other all along.

 

 

Note: Above translation by Coleman Barks. Please comment if you have the original.

Mascara/Impermanence by Hal W. Lanse

Ecstasy of sadness
Bold yellow
Drooping daisies
Edges curling

There is bright color still
Only touches of brown
On the daisy-eyes
Mascara
Impermanence
Around the edges

A moment has passed
Fresh life
Young life

Old life
Tenuous beauty
Remains
Until all is mascara—

Our Other Sister by Jeffrey Harrison

for Ellen

The cruelest thing I did to my younger sister
wasn’t shooting a homemade blowdart into her knee,
where it dangled for a breathless second

before dropping off, but telling her we had
another, older sister who’d gone away.
What my motives were I can’t recall: a whim,

or was it some need of mine to toy with loss,
to probe the ache of imaginary wounds?
But that first sentence was like a strand of DNA

that replicated itself in coiling lies
when my sister began asking her desperate questions.
I called our older sister Isabel

and gave her hazel eyes and long blonde hair.
I had her run away to California
where she took drugs and made hippie jewelry.

Before I knew it, she’d moved to Santa Fe
and opened a shop. She sent a postcard
every year or so, but she’d stopped calling.

I can still see my younger sister staring at me,
her eyes widening with desolation
then filling with tears. I can still remember

how thrilled and horrified I was
that something I’d just made up
had that kind of power, and I can still feel

the blowdart of remorse stabbing me in the heart
as I rushed to tell her none of it was true.
But it was too late. Our other sister

had already taken shape, and we could not
call her back from her life far away
or tell her how badly we missed her.

This is the age of iron in the throat by Antonio Gamoneda

THIS is the age of iron in the throat. There.

You inhabit yourself but do not recognize yourself: you live in an abandoned vault in which you listen to your heart

while grease and oblivion spread through all your veins and

you calcify amid the pain and from your mouth

fall black syllables.

You make your way toward the invisible

and know that what does not exist is real.

Vaguely, you keep your causes and your dreams

(you still retain the fragrance of the suicides),

they feed your rage and piety.

Not much of you remains: your vertigo, your fingernails

and shadows of memories.

You think of disappearance. You caress

the cerebral darkness, drop to the liver charred by grief.

Such is the age of iron in the throat. Now

nothing can be understood. And even so,

you love as much as you have lost.

Note: Translated from the Spanish by Robin Myers. Following is the original.

ÉSTA es la edad del hierro en la garganta. Ya.

Te habitas a ti mismo pero te desconoces; vives en una bóveda abandonada en la que escuchas tu propio corazón

mientras la grasa y el olvido se extienden por tus venas y

te calcificas en el dolor y de tu boca

caen sílabas negras.

Vas hacia lo invisible

y sabes que es real lo que no existe.

Retienes vagamente tus causas y tus sueños

(aún conservas el olor de los suicidas),

te alimentan la ira y la piedad.

Queda poco de ti: vértigo, uñas

y sombras de recuerdos.

Piensas la desaparición. Acaricias

la tiniebla cerebral, bajas al hígado calcinado por la tristeza.

Así es la edad del hierro en la garganta. Ya

todo es incompresible. Sin embargo,

amas aún cuanto has perdido.

Wise up by Aimee Mann

It’s not
What you thought
When you first began it
You got
What you want
Now you can hardly stand it though,
By now you know
It’s not going to stop
It’s not going to stop
It’s not going to stop
‘Til you wise up

You’re sure
There’s a cure
And you have finally found it
You think
One drink
Will shrink you ’til you’re underground
And living down
But it’s not going to stop
It’s not going to stop
It’s not going to stop
‘Til you wise up

Prepare a list of what you need
Before you sign away the deed
‘Cause it’s not going to stop
It’s not going to stop
It’s not going to stop
‘Til you wise up
No, it’s not going to stop
‘Til you wise up
No, it’s not going to stop
So just… give up

I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings by Maya Angelou

The free bird leaps
on the back of the win
and floats downstream
till the current ends
and dips his wings
in the orange sun rays
and dares to claim the sky.

But a bird that stalks
down his narrow cage
can seldom see through
his bars of rage
his wings are clipped and
his feet are tied
so he opens his throat to sing.

The caged bird sings
with fearful trill
of the things unknown
but longed for still
and is tune is heard
on the distant hillfor the caged bird
sings of freedom

The free bird thinks of another breeze
an the trade winds soft through the sighing trees
and the fat worms waiting on a dawn-bright lawn
and he names the sky his own.

But a caged bird stands on the grave of dreams
his shadow shouts on a nightmare scream
his wings are clipped and his feet are tied
so he opens his throat to sing

The caged bird sings
with a fearful trill
of things unknown
but longed for still
and his tune is heard
on the distant hill
for the caged bird
sings of freedom.

Things to Think by Robert Bly

Think in ways you’ve never thought before.
If the phone rings, think of it as carrying a message
Larger than anything you’ve ever heard,
Vaster than a hundred lines of Yeats.

Think that someone may bring a bear to your door,
Maybe wounded and deranged; or think that a moose
Has risen out of the lake, and he’s carrying on his antlers
A child of your own whom you’ve never seen.

When someone knocks on the door,
Think that he’s about
To give you something large: tell you you’re forgiven,
Or that it’s not necessary to work all the time,
Or that it’s been decided that if you lie down no one will die.

A dream within a dream by Edgar Allan Poe

Take this kiss upon the brow!
And, in parting from you now,
Thus much let me avow–
You are not wrong, who deem
That my days have been a dream;
Yet if hope has flown away
In a night, or in a day,
In a vision, or in none,
Is it therefore the less gone?
All that we see or seem
Is but a dream within a dream.

I stand amid the roar
Of a surf-tormented shore,
And I hold within my hand
Grains of the golden sand–
How few! yet how they creep
Through my fingers to the deep,
While I weep–while I weep!
O God! can I not grasp
Them with a tighter clasp?
O God! can I not save
One from the pitiless wave?
Is all that we see or seem
But a dream within a dream?

Daddy by Sylvia Plath

    You do not do, you do not do
    Any more, black shoe
    In which I have lived like a foot
    For thirty years, poor and white,
    Barely daring to breathe or Achoo.

    Daddy, I have had to kill you.
    You died before I had time--
    Marble-heavy, a bag full of God,
    Ghastly statue with one gray toe
    Big as a Frisco seal

    And a head in the freakish Atlantic
    Where it pours bean green over blue
    In the waters off beautiful Nauset.
    I used to pray to recover you.
    Ach, du.

    In the German tongue, in the Polish town
    Scraped flat by the roller
    Of wars, wars, wars.
    But the name of the town is common.
    My Polack friend

    Says there are a dozen or two.
    So I could never tell where you
    Put your foot, your root,
    I could never talk to you.
    The tongue stuck in my jaw.

    It stuck in a barb wire snare.
    Ich, ich, ich, ich.
    I could hardly speak.
    I thought every German was you.
    And the language obscene

    An engine, an engine
    Chuffing me off like a Jew.
    A Jew to Dachau, Auschwitz, Belsen.
    I began to talk like a Jew.
    I think I may well be a Jew.

    The snows of Tyrol, the clear beer of Vienna
    Are not very pure or true.
    With my gipsy ancestress and my weird luck
    And my Taroc pack and my Taroc pack
    I may be a bit of a Jew.

    I have always been scared of _you_,
    With your Luftwaffe, your gobbledygoo.
    And your neat mustache
    And your Aryan eye, bright blue.
    Panzer-man, panzer-man, O You--

    Not God but a swastika
    So black no sky could squeak through.
    Every woman adores a Fascist,
    The boot in the face, the brute
    Brute heart of a brute like you.

    You stand at the blackboard, daddy,
    In the picture I have of you,
    A cleft in your chin instead of your foot
    But no less a devil for that, no not
    Any less than the black man who

    Bit my pretty red heart in two.
    I was ten when they buried you.
    At twenty I tried to die
    And get back, back, back to you.
    I thought even the bones would do.

    But they pulled me out of the sack,
    And they stuck me together with glue.
    And then I knew what to do.
    I made a model of you,
    A man in black with a Meinkampf look

    And a love of the rack and the screw.
    And I said I do, I do.
    So daddy, I'm finally through.
    The black telephone's off at the root,
    The voices just can't worm through.

    If I've killed one man, I've killed two--
    The vampire who said he was you
    And drank my blood for a year,
    Seven years, if you want to know.
    Daddy, you can lie back now.

    There's a stake in your fat black heart
    And the villagers never liked you.
    They are dancing and stamping on you.
    They always _knew_ it was you.
    Daddy, daddy, you bastard, I'm through.

Do not stand at my grave and weep by Mary Elizabeth Frye

Do not stand at my grave and weep,

I am not there, I do not sleep.

I am in a thousand winds that blow,

I am the softly falling snow.

I am the gentle showers of rain,

I am the fields of ripening grain.

I am in the morning hush,

I am in the graceful rush

Of beautiful birds in circling flight,

I am the starshine of the night.

I am in the flowers that bloom,

I am in a quiet room.

I am in the birds that sing,

I am in each lovely thing.

Do not stand at my grave and cry,

I am not there. I do not die.

Chakley (Brothels) by Sahir Ludhianvi

These lanes, these marts of rich delights,
Precious lives, undone, defiled;
Where are the defenders of virtuous pride?
Where are they who praise, the pious eastern ways?

These sinuous streets, these doors ajar,
The clinking coins, the moving masks,
Deals of honour, hagglings fast,
Where are they who praise, the pious eastern ways?

These dimly-lighted, stinking streets,
These yellowing buds, crushed and ceased,
These hollow charms, for sale and lease;
Where are they who praise, the pious eastern ways?

The jingling trinklets at casement bright,
Tambourins athrob’ mid gasping life;
Cheerless rooms with cough alive;
Where are they who praise, the pious eastern ways?

Boisterous laughs on public paths,
Crowds at windows, thick and fast,
Vulgar words, obscene remarks;
Where are they who praise, the pious eastern ways?

The betel spittal, the floral wreaths,
Audacious looks and filthy speech,
Flaccid figures, looks diseased;
Where are they who praise, the pious eastern ways?

Lecherous eyes in beauty’s quest,
Extended hands chasing breasts,
Springing feet on stairs pressed;
Where are they who praise, the pious eastern ways?

This is the haven of young and old.
Aging sires and youngsters bold,
Wife, mother and sister — she plays a triple role.
Where are they who praise, the pious eastern ways?

Help, O Help, this daughter of Eve!
Radha’s child, Yashoda’s breed;
The prophet’s race, Zuleikha’s seed;
Where are they who praise, the pious eastern ways?

Call, O call the leaders wise
Let them see these streets, these sights,
Where are the champs of eastern pride?
Where are they who praise, the pious eastern ways?

Note: Above translation in English by K.C. Kanda. Following is the original in romanized Urdu.

chakley

ye kooche ye neelaam ghar dil_kashi ke
ye luT_te hue kaarawaaN zindagii ke
kahaaN haiN, kahaaN haiN muhaafiz Khudi ke?

sanaa-Khwaan-e-taqdees-e-mashriq kahaaN haiN?

ye pur-pech galiyaaN, ye be-Khwaab baazaar
ye gumnaam raahii, ye sikkoN ki jhaNkaar
ye ismat ke saude, ye saudoN pe takaraar

sanaa-Khwaan-e-taqdees-e-mashriq kahaaN haiN?

ta’affun se pur neem-roshan ye galiyaaN
ye maslee hui adh-khilee zard kaliyaaN
ye bikati hui khokalii rang-raliyaaN

sanaa-Khwaan-e-taqdees-e-mashriq kahaaN haiN?

vo ujale dareechoN meiN paayal ki chhan-chhan
tanaffus ki uljhan pe tabale ki dhan-dhan
ye be-ruuh kamroN meiN khaaNsii kii Dhan-Dhan

sanaa-Khwaan-e-taqdees-e-mashriq kahaaN haiN?

ye guuNje hue qah-qahe raastoN par
ye chaaroN taraf bheeR si khiRkiyoN par
ye aawaazeN khiNchate hue aaNchaloN par

sanaa-Khwaan-e-taqdees-e-mashriq kahaaN haiN?

ye phuuloN ke gajare, ye peekoN ke chheeNTe
ye be-baak nazreN, ye gustaaKh fiqare
ye Dhalake badan aur ye madqooq chehare

sanaa-Khwaan-e-taqdees-e-mashriq kahaaN haiN?

ye bhuukii nigaaheN haseenoN ki jaanib
ye baRate hue haath seenoN ki jaanib
lapakate hue paaNv zeenoN ki jaanib

sanaa-Khwaan-e-taqdees-e-mashriq kahaaN haiN?

yahaaN peer bhii aa chuke haiN jawaaN bhi
tanuumand beTe bhi, abbaa miyaaN bhi
ye biwi bhi hai aur behan bhi hai, maaN bhi

sanaa-Khwaan-e-taqdees-e-mashriq kahaaN haiN?

madad chaahti hai ye hawwaa ki beTi
yashodaa ki ham-jins raadhaa ki beTi
payaMbar ki ummat zulaiKhaa ki beTi

sanaa-Khwaan-e-taqdees-e-mashriq kahaaN haiN?

zaraa mulk ke raahbaroN ko bulaao
ye kuuche ye galiyaaN ye maNzar dikhaao
sanaa-Khwaan-e-taqdees-e-mashriq ko laao

sanaa-Khwaan-e-taqdees-e-mashriq kahaaN haiN?

My Daughter Waits by the Door by Mir Mahfuz Ali

We live on a council estate, my daughter and I.
Nine years old, but she looks much younger.
She has not yet learnt to read the minds

and the motives of our neighbours. It’s a month
now since they stopped playing with her,
Heather, Helen, Edmond and Simon.

When I bring her home from school she
doesn’t take off her jacket, but waits.
When a breeze whistles past the house

she opens the blue door with a smile
to see whether anybody waits outside
asking her to play on the reckless street

smothered in hostile dust; but no-one is there.
A long emptiness howls like a mad dog
chained in unknown hatred at the gate.

Her heart hardens like the weary
paving stones. Nobody comes
to soften my daughter’s fallen spirit.

Totally like whatever, you know? by Taylor Mali

In case you hadn’t noticed,
it has somehow become uncool
to sound like you know what you’re talking about?
Or believe strongly in what you’re saying?
Invisible question marks and parenthetical (you know?)’s
have been attaching themselves to the ends of our sentences?
Even when those sentences aren’t, like, questions? You know?

Declarative sentences – so-called
because they used to, like, DECLARE things to be true
as opposed to other things which were, like, not -
have been infected by a totally hip
and tragically cool interrogative tone? You know?
Like, don’t think I’m uncool just because I’ve noticed this;
this is just like the word on the street, you know?
It’s like what I’ve heard?
I have nothing personally invested in my own opinions, okay?
I’m just inviting you to join me in my uncertainty?

What has happened to our conviction?
Where are the limbs out on which we once walked?
Have they been, like, chopped down
with the rest of the rain forest?
Or do we have, like, nothing to say?
Has society become so, like, totally . . .
I mean absolutely . . . You know?
That we’ve just gotten to the point where it’s just, like . . .
whatever!

And so actually our disarticulation . . . ness
is just a clever sort of . . . thing
to disguise the fact that we’ve become
the most aggressively inarticulate generation
to come along since . . .
you know, a long, long time ago!

I entreat you, I implore you, I exhort you,
I challenge you: To speak with conviction.
To say what you believe in a manner that bespeaks
the determination with which you believe it.
Because contrary to the wisdom of the bumper sticker,
it is not enough these days to simply QUESTION AUTHORITY.
You have to speak with it, too.