19 August 2006

Samurai Song, The Sun Never Says

Two poems that have been on the mind of Prometheus. These may seem difficult to read since the linebreak is at seemingly odd places. But such is poetic license. Prometheus is off to apply for one.

Samurai Song
-Robert Pinsky

When I had no roof I made
Audacity my roof. When I had
No supper my eyes dined.

When I had no eyes I listened.
When I had no ears I thought.
When I had no thought I waited.

When I had no father I made
Care my father. When I had
No mother I embraced order.

When I had no friend I made
Quiet my friend. When I had no
Enemy I opposed my body.

When I had no temple I made
My voice my temple. I have
No priest, my tongue is my choir.

When I have no means fortune
Is my means. When I have
Nothing, death will be my fortune.

Need is my tactic, detachment
Is my strategy. When I had
No lover I courted my sleep.




The Sun Never Says
-Hafiz

Even
After
All this time
The sun never says to the earth,

"You owe Me."

Look
What happens
With a love like that,
It lights the
Whole Sky.

Thanks to Suhit San for sharing these with me.

4 comments:

Lizza said...

Poetry. These are lovely, but I like the second one more. Ahh, if we all could give/receive such love!

The poems that have been on my mind lately are: If You Forget Me (Neruda) and part of Tagore's The Gardener (the part that starts with "Your questioning eyes are sad").

Some that I've always loved: Shakespeare's Sonnet CXVI and XXIX, Jonson's Song to Celia, and Thomas' Do Not Go Gentle.

Me poetic license has expired. What do I need to have it renewed?

Prometheus said...

Not too much into ol Will myself, save for Macbeth and Othello (dunno if he really wrote them).

I love Arun Kolatkar, e.e. cummings, Coleridge, Kipling, Tennyson, Sir Walter (Lochinvar) Scott, Wordsworth, P.B. Shelley, Keats and Byron.

Would love to post some here, if the audience so desires.

Lizza said...

I desire.

Your finger hasn't been moving/writing in quite a while. [drums own fingers impatiently]

Terra Shield said...

I liked the 2nd one too. Anyway, I'm gonna link ya.