Act - Mildred Sope

People of the earth

Where are you going

Fast

     Faster

          Faster yet

Where is the limit

To what end do we rush

Spring's Messengers in Australia - Frances Tyrrell Gill

Eve winds awake the crocus-flower. 

The faint narcissus dares unfold 

Her face uncaring of the cold; 

As though in dream she heard the shower, 

And breathed the sunshine of that hour 

The roses may behold. 

I traverse the world - Benumah

I traverse this world as though

As though I am not supposed to be here

Not as a Christian with a view of her heavenly home

No

In Damen - Frank Báez

In Damen there’s a bar

where the employees loosen their ties

and drink beer with girls who steal

poetry from the bookstore on the corner.

Splendid are the heavens high - N. F. S. Grundtvig

Splendid are the heavens high,
Beautiful the radiant sky,
Where the golden stars are shining,
And their rays, to earth inclining,
-: Beckon us to heaven above :-

Rejoice (Oh Ye Africans) - Gladys May Casely-Hayford

Rejoice and shout with laughter

Throw all your burdens down,

If God has been so gracious

As to make you black or brown.

The Beloved - A.R. Cliff-Lubwa

Lapobo,

Tall but not too tall,

Short but not too short,

She is of medium size.

Parting from the Eldest Youth of the Tung Family - Kao-Shih

Long leagues of tawny sky shut out the day:

On the North Wind wind geese are whirled:

And fast, fast drives of snow.

The Bombax Tree - Fily Dabo Sissoko

Stripped of his crown

he stands

at the center of the town,

the crooks of his branches

heavy with enormous

warts.

Visions - Caetano da Costa Alegre

I saw you pass, far from me, far away, 

Like a walking ebony statue; 

Dubai - Ozy Prince

The morning is traffic,

More work, everyone is waiting, but,

The night shines like the sun and the stars together.

I can touch gold and diamond because it is everywhere.

Excuse me, I think I am dying - Lena Ruth Stefanović

Two years ago I passed away

No, really

I haven’t written about it

Which is unusual

Given that I write about almost everything

City Sunset - Celestine Kulagoe

At six

the sun sets

escorted by puffs of blushing clouds,

Curaçao - Pierre A. Lauffer

Where there are rocks
As far as eyes can reach,
     Stubborn, stingy,
     That turn
     And look down
     Disdainfully

Peace to the Amir - Mubarak bin Saif al Thani

Swearing by God who upraised the sky,

Swearing by God who spread the light,

Qatar will always be free,

Pan's Pub - Tibor Babiczky

Everything must be paid for, I reflected,

as we sat beneath

an impossibly yellow sunshade,

not waiting for anything in particular,

we just sat, it was a pleasant and enjoyable

The Advent candles - Inger Hagerup

Then we light a candle tonight,

we light it for joy.

It stands shining by itself

and for us who are present..

Then we light a candle tonight,

we light it for joy.

Hope - Chanbo Keo

Hope for a better day,

Hope for the sunray

Of a great weather,

Tomorrow...

Little Bird - Katama Wui

One morning I got up

to pick oranges in the garden.

And I saw this.

Yes, I do love Allah! - Siham

I knelt to pray but not for long,

I had too much to do.

I had to hurry and get to work

For bills would soon be due.

hearts of stone - Farah Didi

we are persistence,

and you, intolerance,

embodied in human form,

patronus - Anita Pajević

there, on the ground floor of our sitting room

in a pot squats a tree

made of life

mum hasn’t changed its soil

in 17 years

The Wind Keeps Blowing - Anonymous

Through the trees the wind keeps blowing,

In our homes we sense its might.

Heritage! - Kélétigui Abdourahmane Mariko

Heritage! Gado!

Nothing is more valuable than heritage

In the Field Filling Up with Snow - Seo Jeong-ju

It’s   all   right,

It’s   all   right,

It’s   all   right,

It’s   all   right–

My City - Medardo Ángel Silva

        Strong waters and oil paintings of

        the city of Santiago de Guayaquil

Island in the light - Sara de Ibáñez

The dove burnt in its whiteness.

The doe dead in the cold grass.

The flower dead, still unnamed,

and the delicate wolf of dark innocence.

He Meditates On The Life Of A Rich Man - Lady Augusta Gregory

A golden cradle under you, and you young;

A right mother and a strong kiss.

Like Sand - Ahmet Kaya

In the garbage dumps seagulls used to cry

While we laughed along with you

Bombs used to rain down on the city every night

While we made love without stopping

The Angels in our countryside - Anonymous

The Angels in our countryside

Sing the hymn of heaven,

It echoes from the mountainside,

Repeats this tuneful song:

Gloria in excelsis Deo!

Gloria in excelsis Deo!

In the Absence of Water - Luljeta Lleshanaku

It’s Sunday. On the soles of shoes

walking in the hallway

snow turns to plasma, and the memories of roads disappear.

A path to the Sea - Krzeslawa Skrzypczynska

Gadgets

I love those our gadgets

color ones,

although alike;

First Poem, Possession in Dream - Eunice Odio

Come

Beloved

I will savor you with joy.

You will dream of me tonight.

Broken Line - Art Ó Súilleabháin

He had been fishing with three flies for the first time

cast in a dignified loop behind his head,

made the ‘whishing’ sound that indicated all was right.

Let the wind run the line through the rings.

Marta Haileyesus - untitled

This poem is about the (sometimes) fleeting nature of romantic love, which in its stage of infatuation can awaken and deeply excite the soul.

where our protest sound - Lenelle Moïse

jazz is underwater

vodou atlantis mute

aborted ultrasound

fetal fish in flood

 

South of my Days - Judith Wright

South of my days' circle, part of my blood's country,

rises that tableland, high delicate outline

of bony slopes wincing under the winter,

the skin I love - Louis-Philippe Dalembert

I love skin

cracked skin

stretch-marked skin

The Coming of Morn - Charles Heavysege

See how the Morn awakes. Along the sky

Proceeds she with her pale, increasing light,

Love, Who in the first beginning - Johannes Engel

Love, Who in the first beginning

Man in thine own likeness made;

Love, Who, when we fell by sinning,

Raised us up no more afraid;

Henceforth I myself resign,

Love, to be for ever thine.

Precipitation is Upon Us - Denny Moonde

Precipitation is upon us

Hoe in hand, turn soil upside down.

In the Name of God - Ahmed Abdul Hussein

You, well of thirst,

Black treasure in the wolf’s mouth,

Let your lamp, that speaks miracles, light the name of Iraq. 

Of course you are still looking for sea glass - Rosanna Montemayor

​you were six when you dropped 

      mama’s vase in the kitchen then buried its shards

            in the tide. Sometimes

Halfway to a House - Rosa Alice Branco

I take light from the closet drawers. The first day

of fall. And all those years at the bottom.

One who lost everything - David Diop

I

The sun was shining in my hut

And my women were beautiful and supple

Like palm trees in the evening breeze.

Is it the night of power - Bibi Hayati

Is it the night of power

Or only your hair?

Is it dawn

Or your face?

Small Stories - Olya Stoyanova

She likes to write notes –

“I love you” to her husband,

“I’m thinking of you” to her child,

“Thank you” to her mother.

11:55 - Kendel Hippolyte

What is the time?

It is the time of Waiting

Legend - Anuradha Majumdar

Man is legend

Each atom child.

Ode to Things That Cut - Marial Awendit

I may allow you to play a wolf

Heavy with the want

To be intentionally mistaken for a dove,

And any furred bits to name you wolf

Can meet shredding fury.

The Fair Little Maiden - Dora Sigerson Shorter

There is one at the door, Wolfe O'Driscoll,

  At the door, who bids you to come!

"Who is he that wakes me in the darkness,

  Calling when all the world is dumb?"

Haft Seen - Shakila Azizzada

If it weren’t for the clouds,

I could

pick the stars

one by one

from this brief sky,

Storm - Enrique Santos Discépolo

Howling amidst lightning,

lost in the storm

of this endless night,

oh Lord! I seek your name…

6 A.M. - Svetlana Cârstean

Good morning, workers!

Forgotten - Enrique Cadícamo

They killed poor Contreras!

They had just gotten married—can you believe it?

let our skins - Inger-Mari Aikio

let our skins

Warm weather - Dostena Angelova-Lavergne

The warm weather

Grows old

The stones: rings

Around the gnawed bones

Of lovers

The Untied Shoelaces - Yevgeny Yevtushenko

Like a ghost in a crowd

I don't leave any traces.

I am snagged in the web

of untied shoelaces...

Each one of the shoelaces

it's owner chases...

Mortis Portis Fractis Fortis - Peter the Venerable

Lo, the gates of death are broken, 

And the strong man arm'd is spoil'd, — 

Of his armour, which he trusted. 

By the stronger arm despoil'd. 

Vanquish'd is the prince of hell, 

Smitten by the Cross he fell. 

O brook - Moses ibn Ezra

O brook, whose hurrying waters go

To the far land that holds my friend,

By thee, my greeting let me send;

A little fool lies here - Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart

A little fool lies here

Whom I held dear—

A starling in the prime

Of his brief time

Vessel - Boris Ryzhy

Enamel bedpan

Window, nightstand, and a bed

Life is hard and uncomfortable

But it's nice to die

The Queen comes to our City - Nina Živančević

"Among the purple feathers

Constance cuts an arresting figure."

As simple as that. I repeat.

the singapore i love - john tiong chunghoo

the Singapore i love is 

when the city holds up

its clouds, playing pom 

pom girls postponing

a drizzle so that the trees 

in the lanes and streets

- with their intermittent 

swinging branches and 

leaves - could hum songs 

Writing - Laura Cesarco Eglin

A phrase is repeating itself. I don’t

yet know what it is

I can hear it coming it’s settling in

Thank you, Lord, for all your goodness - August L. Storm

Thank you, Lord, for all your goodness

Through the years of yesterday;

Thank you, too, for present mercies

And your blessing on my way.

The Collapse of Power - Saw Wai

under this sha-manic sky

with its favourable spirits and forks of lightning

why do unknown numbers

dance into obscurity?

Armstrong! oh Armstrong!

are there multi-coloured cauldrons

in the centre of your iris?

how sublime your iris!

truly 

in this most totemic of pressure-cookers

there is: 

 no Thomas Edison

 no Kanaung prince

 no Thein Pe Myint

 no Jack London

 no Vincent Van Gogh

 no Paw Oo Thet

 no Saya Zawgyi

 no Rabindranath Tagore

 no John Lennon

 no Myoma Nyein

 no collegian Ne Win

 no Robert Redford

 no Harold Robbins

 no Ahtoutthaw Hla Aung

 no Thakhin Aung San

 no nothing is there

 no nothing 

 no 

 everything

look!

(in the cauldron of dreamtime)

how these bubbling mists

of a jungle imagination

are demented and embellished

by the red of

first light

---

Saw Wai [U Saw Wei] (20th century) Myanmar

Translated by Niall McDevitt.

Source: National Poetry Library (From The Wolf No 17 (Spring 2008))

Old Surrealist Ballad - José Lezama Lima

When the rivulet swells with lashing

snaketails and the piano with its backside turned

displays its shoes shining like the night

Duet - Trish Harris

I became an old woman

age eleven

The Chicken-seller - Han Dong

He's got the knack for killing chickens quick, so

He became a chicken-seller, that way

He doesn't need to kill people. Even though he acts

Calm and gentle, and never beats his wife

Whoever Comes From The Earth - Nelly Sachs

Whoever

comes from the Earth

reaching for the moon

or

other heavenly mineral flower –

will soar high

The Emigrant - Ndue Ukaj

He has only questions, his answers so very timid

In dirty pockets with concreted nostalgia.

He has only memories that surround his neck

Like the millstone they shake him one step forward and a few backward,

While caressing in torrential waterfall,

And kidnapping the time which he never sees.

I Have forgotten - Milarepa

May I be far removed from contending creeds and dogmas.

Ever since my Lord’s grace entered my mind,

My mind has never strayed to seek such distractions.

Accustomed long to contemplating love and compassion,

I have forgotten all difference between myself and others.

Joe - Ana Célia da Silva

Down the street

there goes Joe,

sad and tired

My Mother - Franco Leoni

She was beautiful, my mother, just 23, that 29th September.

Her face was gentle, calm, my beautiful mother.

Dear African Woman - Brenda Dokmah Bakomora

Dear African Woman

If I haven’t told you that you are beautiful, you are

If I haven’t told you that your smile is lovely, it is

If I havent told you that your dark skin

is more beautiful than the night sky, it is

when a child talks of heartbreak - Philip C. Abonyi

when a child talks of heartbreak

she is a room of combating shadows

broken utensils

Rubáiyát of Omar Khayyám (Quatrains XIII - XXIII) - Omar Khayyám

Look to the Rose that blows about us — 'Lo, 

Laughing' she says, 'into the World I blow; 

At once the silken Tassel of my Purse 

Tear, and its Treasure on the Garden throw.' 

Valleys on the Road to Dalvik - Alan Gould

From green to indigo

the valleys intermarry

shoulders, rumps and laps.

All Gisli's kids were poets,

all Egil's sons were dolts.

Ghazal - Bâḳî

'Tis love's wild sea, my sighs' fierce wind doth lash those waves my tears uprear; 

My head, the bark of sad despite; mine eyebrows twain, the anchors here. 

The Courtesan Speaks to Her Lover - Kshetrayya

I'm seeing you at last.

It's been four or five months,

Muvva Gopala!

Child cry of war - Onam Liduba

I was found along the road side in open ash air

I grew like a child of leach

No mother and no father

Potato Thief - Pentti Saarikoski

The year was as long and dark as a bed,

I slept between two winds;

the bush was filling with black berries.

A poem for Zimbabwe - Chenjerai Hove

i am the only one

you are the only one.

Calendar of an Invisible April - Odysseus Elytis

“The wind was whistling continuously, it was

getting darker, and that distant voice was

incessantly reaching my ears : “an entire life”…

“an entire life”…

A Naughty Game - Indah Widiastuti

An afternoon delight gleaming in

the corners of my eyes, made me

feel beautiful and entitled a right

to allure the slanting sun.

Listen Compatriots! - Nontsizi Mgqwetho

Peace, Nintsizi, renowned for you chanting,

your poems are the nation's bounty.

No elephant finds its own trunk clumsy.

Oh peace, hen of Africa with sheltering wing!

To New York - Léopold Sédar Senghor

– I –

New York! At first I was bewildered by your beauty,

Those huge, long-legged, golden girls.

So shy, at first, before your blue metallic eyes and icy smile,

So shy. And full of despair at the end of skyscraper streets

Raising my owl eyes at the eclipse of the sun.

My First Love - Chioniso Tsikisayi

Hie, Jesus

Sometimes I can’t get my thoughts to flow coherently when I pray.

So I figured that it would be better to

translate my feelings into writing.

This is my love letter to you❤

nielles - Laruent Fels

stone of clay

in the void

of sands

Garden - Andreas Okopenko

Deep garden

of dark-green leaves

they come from the ground

and are moist.

Nyeri - Beatrice Lamwaka

I almost became that man’s second wife

I twisted my underwear here and there

I hynoptised myself that he was the one

I always thought of him.

The Empty Sky - Ágnes Nemes Nagy

The empty sky. The empty sky.

I can't tell what might satisfy.

His Majesty - Tembong Denis Fonge

The ever shining star

Of the greatest royal rocks of Nkongho,

Where always you stood tall,

His majesty Tazanu njung-efuellah.

You are the rose of Sharon,

And the lily of the valleys.

As the lily among thorns,

So is your love for your daughters.

As the apple tree among the trees of wood,

So is your care among your sons.

From Day to Night - Dahlia Ravikovitch

Every day I rise from sleep again

as if for the last time.

The Earth's Attraction - Yannis Ritsos

A moon glued to the windowpane like a cancelled postage stamp

on a letter undelivered. The closed furniture shop filled

with tables, armchairs, mirrors. A lone dog frightened by its own shadow

The Disappeared - Margarita Serafimova

We are roots,

we are the unknown earth’s own,

we spread out in the eyeballs of the killers,

we are their blood vessels.

Sky-scalers—madcaps—with wine-wetted dresses - Abdallah Nihauni

Summer yet lingers, yet blushes and blesses,

Dazzling the dells with her sunbeamy tresses:

Here let us revel, defying excesses.

SKY-SCALERS—MADCAPS—WITH WINE-WETTED DRESSES!

Greek Chorus Hears Medusa Doing Zumba - Rayji de Guia

​Did you hear mga dear Medusa

attends Zumba na? Left Mixxedfit

a misfit, tits slipping through the fit of her slip.

Dear Christ we crave thy favour - Magnus Felix Ennodius

Dear Christ we crave thy favour, 

To guide our steps aright; 

O, hear our tearful voices, 

Be with us through the night. 

Messages - Kofi Awoonor

On time's lap sat simmering

burnt on lost hearths' desires,

tasks fulfilled not fulfilled

An old woman who was considered beautiful (Sonnet 1) - Diego Hurtado de Mendoza

     You have, Mistress Aldonza, three times thirty years,

three strands of hair, no more, and just one tooth,

breasts more fitting for a grasshopper,

where spiderwebs and scratches abound.

Circling Zero - Ana Ristovic

We are independent women.

We breathe asthmatically

while waiting for new love. We pop pills

of unfulfilled promises. We drown in murky dreams.

Twenty-four hours a day we painfully make love

to a migraine and forgive her

because she is female.

 

What our dead can do - Zbigniew Herbert

Jan came this morning

—I dreamt of my father

he says

Lessons for Young Women - Frances-Marie Coke

Proper English words were not enough

to teach the serious lessons girls must learn.

Solaua, a secret embryo - Momoe Malietoa Von Reiche

She can smell

Cowdung in the mist of

Solaua, where her heart

Is suspended

Jesus, thy blood and righteousness - Nicolaus Ludwig von Zinzendorf

Jesus, thy blood and righteousness

my beauty are, my glorious dress;

'midst flaming worlds, in these arrayed,

with joy shall I lift up my head.

If You Could - Assamala Amoi

If you could leave when work was done

Like the sun at the end of its day;

Spreading My Wings - Magie Faure-Vidot

I am the captain of my own destiny

One humble and tiny

However over the oceans I spread my wings

And in the ball-room I practise the best swings

The Hometown Girl - Lisímaco Chavarría

The young campesino returned to his humble home

in the evening, tools in one hand,

a bouquet of wildflowers in the other

—a small offering for his beautiful girl

A March Invocation - Ivan Laučík

Let the snow speak out

in the needles of pine

what is again an embrace ...

Weaving stones - Valerie Bichard

Deep within the jungle

Where no missionary dared to tread

Part of my great-grandmother's finger lost

To calm the cannibal king

No girl child could be the family's firstborn

So in the night they fled

Sint Maarten - John Robert Lee

i.

The Blue Bitch Bar, on the boardwalk

behind Front Street, Philipsburg,

was where we read, Friday night,

during the Book Fair —

So, faith is certain - John Robert Lee

So, faith is certain of tomorrow’s epiphany

but how to meet the apocalyptic moment of now

under fallen colonnades of the Presidential palace

tent cities of cholera and rape and empty-bellied children

Return to the Mother Country - MAB Elhad

There I am again, tender and dear country,

I come back to you empty handed,

But the heart rich of hope.

My Own Reality Sign - Valeen Kan

I don’t know my feelings anymore

I feel insanity enveloping me

Not allowing a small opening

For me to taste happiness

spring notes - Sonam Chhoki

first thaw

dwarf rhododendrons

colour the slope

Jasmine Revolution Poem - Mohammad al-Ajami Ibn al-Dheeb

Prime Minister, Mohamed al-Ghannouchi:

If we measured your might

it wouldn’t hold a candle

to a constitution.

The Worthlessness of this World - Abdulla Fahumy Didi

This ethereal world of ours

Is alien to worthless trash.

And that which craves it most

Is a creature but unnameable.

They remain lying on the earth - Agnès Agboton

They remain lying on the earth

the dark bodies of men

after a useless death

The curse of being black with no direction - Sibusiso Adontsi

The curse of being black with no direction, 

lost with no resurrection, 

hopes of a future blurry, 

lost and it’s looking scary.

Child - Didier Marouani

Child,

Forget your lonely fathers,

Beguiled

Not able to look farther,

Than they should, than they could.

 

Chill - Shrawan Mukarung

Children are basking in the fire under the lamppost.

This chill has been prevalent for ages.

Silent warriors - Innocenta M. Sound-Kikku

Mama

a silent warrior

a familiar and comforting

voice I often hear

Nei Mwanganibuka The Legendary Fisherwoman - Tereeao Teingiia Ratite

I’ve always wanted to be like Nei Mwanganibuka

With all her skills

I could survive, conquer the realities of life

Put back the little fishes where they belong

Yangon 2010 - Maung Yu Py

Parents and guardians jostle over the quality of education available to their children, it’s been observed.

The Fire Chariot - Michel Lentz

The fire chariot, it's all set,
It whistles and off we go,
Rushing over the road of iron
And it will proudly show to our neighbours
That now, we have also found our way
To the great league of nations.

Yearning for Mountain Solitude - Patrul Rinpoche

Having seen the bewildering scope of never-ending activities,

All so unnecessary and frivolous,

Within delusory perception of this world, this city of saṃsāra,

Abu's attention turns to the solitude of the mountains.

No Death Can - Patrick Chamoiseau

There are so many oak trees in Atlanta that moan still

Fields that mourn

That also sing

And that imprint upon capsules of cotton unbelievable torsions!

XIV - Frank Martinus Arion

Same way a melody can enter a man, rips into him

Sending him to shimmy and dance on his feet,

Pushing him to lose his balance and his good name,

making smoke come smoldering off his marching body—

Ink: A Recipe - Bryan Thao Worra

Mo. Ink.  Two characters:

Hei, Black. Earth, T’u.

Song of Peace - Arif Khudairi

If we all

Belong to

One father,

And one mother.

If we all

Are brothers:

Yellows,

Blacks,

And whites.

Lady Macbeth's Confession - Neisha Tweed

Never mind thick night! Darkness move quick!

Madness engulf me like Jacob's coat;

colors tighten like sickness 'round me throat.

Wha it is do already can't tek back

but it still got me a wash me hand

til they sour and callus, de visions

plaguing de dark a me mind like locust.

Why is the child crying? - José Carlos Schwarz

Why is the child crying?

His body hurts

Why is the child crying?

He's tired of seeing blood

 

On the incompatibility of Pride and True Glory - Abu Alola

Think not, Abdallah, pride and fame 

Can ever travel hand in hand; 

With breast opposed, and adverse aim, 

On the same narrow path they stand. 

Nauru our homeland - Margaret Hendrie

Nauru our homeland, the land we dearly love.

We all pray for you and we also praise your name.

There is not only you - Dara Kanlagna

There lived a widower with her descendants

She is not anxious with any assistance

Day by day she does merits making

She thought there are no other mothers who can do as her

Legends of Time and Place - René Noyau

The stars are no longer lights,

They are faces that smile

Because the sky as well as my heart is clear.

Anne Frank - Heberto Padilla

In front of Cologne Cathedral

—divided by two black columns—

once more the children

are taking up their songs.

You are my song, my dark-blue dream - Velemir Khlebnikov

You are my song, my dark-blue dream

of doves, of winter's drowsy drone,

This is my country rising - Ernest Pépin

This is my country rising 

With the sun's luminous fist

It puts sandals of justice on its feet

Air Pollution - Adrianna Ennelinda Pedro

Oh, my dearest, beautiful Tuvalu,

Bicycles are seen less and less on your roads every day,

And your people walk less and less every day,

Afterwards - Homero Manzi

Afterwards…

the bloody moon and your emotion,

knowing that the end is coming

on a dark stormcloud.

Andorra: The Voice of the Mountain - Ester Fenoll García

I open my eyes

fine snowflakes

blanket Andorra

Breathless Postcard - Armando Freitas Filho

Nature doesn't nurture anything

it never looks back

parasols and paradise

and every verb in the infinite

Song - Hovhannes Hovhanessian

How often in my life to find

Tranquillity I yearned!

Ever with visions infinite

My heart within me burned.

Frithiof Saga, Canto I: Frithiof and Ingeborg - Esaias Tegnér

Two plants, in Hilding’s garden fair,

Grew up beneath his fostering care;

Their match the North had never seen,

So nobly tow’r’d they in the green!

Wishes are fulfilled - Fujiwara no Tokifusa

Wishes are fulfilled

In these rushing waters of the god

Sunny Prestatyn - Philip Larkin

Come To Sunny Prestatyn

Laughed the girl on the poster,

Kneeling up on the sand   

In tautened white satin. 

Liber IX.V (You wish to marry) - Marcus Valerius Martialis

You wish to marry, Priscus;

I don't wonder, Paula; you are wise.

jericho - Desmond Kon Zhicheng-Mingdé

J is for Jericho because walls exist

*

J is for Jericho because it has an incredible history.

J is also for John Wilkinson.

The Old Town of Plovdiv - Ivan Theofilov

Your ancient floors float among the stars.

Blue donkeys graze the silence around.

A philosopher’s agony - Augusto dos Anjos

I read the Phtah-Hotep, I read the obsolete

Rig-Veda. Yet  nothing gives me rest…

The Unconscious haunts me and I swirl possessed,

Restless harmattan in aeolian rage!

A Persian Song - Hafez

Sweet maid, if thou wouldst charm my sight. 

And bid these arms thy neck enfold: 

That rosy cheek, that lily hand, 

Would give thy poet more delight 

Than all Bocara's vaunted gold. 

Than all the gems of Samarkand. 

A Queer Challenge - Satish Verma

World wanted

to know, how I am.

I say, ask my poems.

Not He is a Great Man - Vincas Kudirka

Not he is a great man before whom the millions

In manacled meekness, in fetters bow down

Yet inwardly curse him; it is not the tyrant

Whom thankful descendants with glory will crown.

A Detail - Uroš Zupan

Bathed in red light,

seated at a table,

alone, an unknown woman gets ready

to light a cigarette.

Out - Agron Tufa

You get up in the morning

And remember you don't know where you left your eyes.

Concening Arion - John Tzetzes

Arion was also from Methymne playing the cithara, as well,

During the times of Croesus and of Periander.

He went to Italy and, specifically, to Sicily.

Dedication - Peter Foersom

Snatch'd from the scenic monarch's glorious crown, 

     A few stray gems I bring. Before thy feet, 

     Exalted fair, in every charm complete, 

With rev'rence and delight I lay them down. 

I learnt Emmy Noether’s Theorem at uni - Monika Herceg

Therefore I may suppose

that were both sinewy female flesh

Our features tell us

every day was a lonely Wednesday

as symmetrical as the hemispheres of our mind 

Pilgrim Song - Gerhard Tersteegen

On, O beloved children,

The evening is at hand,

And desolate and fearful

The solitary land.

Take heart! the rest eternal

Awaits our weary feet;

From strength to strength press onwards,

The end, how passing sweet!

The Dawn - Lillian Ingonga

In the twilight (sic)

The first bird sings a melody

To break the darkness silence

On Health - Jan Kochanowski

My good and noble health,

Thou matter’st more then wealth.

None know’th thy worth until

Thou fad’st, and we fall ill.

Mania in the Post-Colony - Siyanda Qoto

I.

It is the morning

that I dread.

Vaslap across the face

razor sharps

run riot on my head.

Masks - Michellan Sarile-Alagao

Mother goes out

with a mask on

buys fruit

comes home

says it is alright

see, we have santol

we eat the bitter lining

with salt

Grapes - Julius Chingono

Today I was fortunate

to stumble upon a vendor

sorting out grapes for sale.

Inside my Zulu hut - Oswald Mtshali

It is a hive

without any bees

to build the walls

with golden bricks of honey.

The Longest-Running Show on Television - Göran Printz-Pählson

The longest-running show on television

Is the one in which the moderator is also the chairman of The board of your company.

Cactus - Bantu Mwaura

Sand,

Dater-less, and

Dry, drry

Dust

That's the environ

Cattle Egret - Okot p' Bitek

My children gather stars

Into their soft songs

And woo the young moon

With their white teeth.

Number 106 - Imtiaz Dharker

We are waving to you from up here,

from the fourth floor to say

don’t worry about us, we are fine.

Where am I? - Parveen Shakir

Where am I

in your life?

In This World Where We Forget - Fernando Pessoa

In this world where we forget

we are shadows of who we are,

and the true expressions we form

in that other where, souls, we live,

are here grimaces and signs.

Beautiful Ferns - Catherine Richardson

Beautiful, delicate, fairy-like things!

Ye bend where the forest its deep shadow flings—

Where the long dank weeds weep their dews all day,

And there falls not a sunbeam to chase them away.

The Horse's Face - Nikolay Alekseyevich Zabolotsky

Animals don't sleep. In the dark after nightfall

They stand over the world like a stone wall.

Obeah Woman - Eileen Hall

So lef’ me, ef you waan’a feel

How p’isin sting from manchineel.

Is my dream true? - Takarai Kikaku

Is my dream true?

Basket - No‘u Revilla

She brings her host a basket:

earrings, mats, testimony

This basket, she says, is medicine.

Santo Domingo - Frank Báez

Theseus reeled in Ariadne’s thread

seeking an exit from the labyrinth

Doubts - Reina María Rodríguez

Today I’d like to write about what I need—

not to waste time

or throw words down into gulleys

descending into my depths

naked and alone

Eyes so tristful - Diego de Saldaña

Eyes so tristful, eyes so tristful, 

Heart so full of care and cumber, 

I was lapped in rest and slumber. 

In the Armenian Mountains - Hovhannes Tumanian

The way was heavy and the night was dark,

And yet we survived

Both sorrow and gloom.

Through the ages we go and gaze at the stark

Steep heights of our land—

The Armenian Highlands.

Beautiful planet Earth! - Bernhard Severin Ingemann

Beautiful planet Earth!

Splendid the heav'ns above!

Lovely the road we as pilgrims take.

Through earth's great kingdoms we

march, singing joyfully,

till we in Paradise awake.

If Love should render me myself - Gaspara Stampa

If Love should render me myself, someday,

And, from that heartless Lord thus release me,

A Woman to Her Lover - Annamayya

Don't you know my house,

garland in the palace of the Love God,

where flowers cast their fragrance everywhere?

The Fickleness of Himalayan Tigers or the Ballad of Human Courage - Mukhtar Shakhanov

Terrible to admit,

almost all of us

should be afraid

of ourselves above everything…

Sailing to Byzantium - William Butler Yeats

That is no country for old men. The young

In one another's arms, birds in the trees

- Those dying generations - at their song,

The salmon-falls, the mackerel-crowded seas,

Fish, flesh, or fowl, commend all summer long

Whatever is begotten, born, and dies.

Caught in that sensual music all neglect

Monuments of unageing intellect.

Hallucination - Zohra Mansouri

I emerge from myself, like an exotic bird.

I absorb the strangeness of the place,

Drawing a sea with the bones of men.

Vertigo 2 - Robert Schindel

I’m poleaxed by sleeping

So tired that I’m weeping

Stuck here in these stones

I won’t be escaping

I Died Alive - Harriet Anena

I died

But my heart still breathed

The True Prison - Ken Saro-Wiwa

It is not the leaking roof

Nor the singing mosquitoes

In the damp, wretched cell

Childhood Stories (extract) - José María Cuéllar

I was born in 1942 if for some reason my mother

has not lost her memory.

The Children in the Moon - Adam Gottlob Oehlenschläger

Hearken, child, unto a story! 

For the moon is in the sky, 

And across her shield of silver, 

See! two tiny cloudlets fly. 

Stormy Night - Jean Lahor

The wind screamed, the wind howled its rages,

The ocean leaped the length of the cliff

And my soul, faced with those surges

Of black rolling waves, breathed with greater relief.

British Merchant Service, 1915 - Cicely Fox Smith

Oh, down by Millwall Basin as I went the other day, 

I met a skipper that I knew, and to him I did say: 

"Now what's the cargo, captain, that brings you up this way?" 

Holy Spirit - Hildegard von Bingen

Holy Spirit,

giving life to all life,

Wild Roses - Mirjam Tuominen

Wild thickets thorn hedges

bar your way

wayless.

While You Decline To Cry - Ō no Yasumaro

While you decline to cry,

high on the mountainside

a single stalk of plumegrass wilts.

To Aphrodite - Hesiod

I will sing of stately Aphrodite, gold-crowned and beautiful, 

whose dominion is the walled cities of all sea-set Cyprus.  

Omri Kello - Wael Kfoury

Oh love go tell her

tell her I miss her so much,

if she wants my life

I'll give it away.

Freedom - Arja Salafranca

Freedom is a man with one arm,

a happy smile showing perfect white teeth,

a man who answers the phone in Maintenance with a chirp in his voice.

By the Margins of the Great Deep - George William Russell

When the breath of twilight blows to flame the misty skies,

All its vaporous sapphire, violet glow and silver gleam

With their magic flood me through the gateway of the eyes;

I am one with the twilight's dream.

a quanta with fidelity - Dhal Jirel 'Ravi'

I also do believe in God

But I do not call myself 

An Incarnation of God

A son of God

A messenger of God

Return - Phi Hoàng

Let me return the sunlight to the sky,

the cloud to the mountain, this life to the void.

Youth and Love: I - Robert Louis Stevenson

Once only by the garden gate

   Our lips we joined and parted.

I must fulfil an empty fate

   And travel the uncharted.

Poetry and I - Mbarka Mint al-Barra’

The sin is that I wasn't a stone

     And the troubles of the world make me sleepless

And I shield myself with poetry

     And it keeps me company when I'm far from home

The Black Streets - Emmanuel Moses

The soldiers on their way to lay siege to the mountain

stopped here to let blue wine blot out

steaming blood

The Beggar - Carl Spitteler

He was my foe, and friend he was to none.

I read his death, unmoved, but yesterday.

jumbo-jet vs jackdaw - S. Zaynub Kamoonpuri

I wish to fly like a bird that chirps or hoots

without any jet or parachutes.

Gazal - Zeyneb

Cast off thy veil, and heaven and earth in dazzling light array! 

As radiant Paradise, this poor demented world display! 

Epigram - Niels Hav

You can spend an entire life

in the company of words

not ever finding

the right one.

The Shining Hours (V) - Emile Verhaeren

Each hour I brood upon your goodness, so simple in its depth, I lose myself in prayers to you. 

So I Am Persuaded - Jaime Saenz

Everyone lives in one

—I, you, they.

We all live in all, no one lives or dies, and each is on his own

—but nobody knows what happens.

Peggy - Allan Ramsay

My Peggy is a young thing,

      Just enter'd in her teens,

Fair as the day, and sweet as May

Fair as the day, and always gay.

Branches That Thirst - Limam Boicha

Beneath the shadow of a thorn tree

two naked people

are shuddering with thirst

while their oasis

lies half a desert away

After History - Tawanda Mulalu

Has anyone managed to make a world.

After race, we turn to genetics, return

after to the archives for new history. Who

then determines when we’re from. Roots,

Sermon - Eveline Maedel

Sunday morning.

Poured molasses oration,

Drizzles onto milky white canvass.

Cold days have come - Samuel Hanagid

The month of ‘Av has ended even ‘Elul and their heat is gone;

Also Tishri is gathered in and like them has passed.

Your Lips Will Tell Me - Hector Marcó

You don’t love me anymore, but I can’t blame you—

if you can do this, then I can hide my tears.

But you alone, you and my heart,

shall answer to God one day.

Poetry - Elisaveta Bagyrana

If my glance were not blest—

with you, inside. Open-eyed to penetrate the darkness,

and to make it fly and dance for me,

The world is for me a tough place - Nadezhda Zaharieva

The world is for me a tough place

But my tenor I choose how to alter:

The first approach of the sweet spring - Le Châtelain de Coucy

The first approach of the sweet spring

Returning here once more,—

I Keep Forgetting - Sima

Don’t know why I keep forgetting,

The time that you played me

The times you would pay me no attention

I keep forgetting all the pain that you cause

That its because of you that I am covered in scars.

After a Death - Tomas Tranströmer

Once there was a shock

that left behind a long, shimmering comet tail.

High above the Dark City - Jaime Saenz

One night on a rain-glistened road high above the dark city

with its now-distant tumult

she will certainly sigh

Miles Away - Homero Pumarol

A black trumpet flies

through the walls

of an empty building.

Let us Paint, World - AminTheRanter

What I am is a body of water,

I am fluid; always moving matter,

Eroding the earth I change the world

even if only the heart of a girl

Underground - Ito Hiromi

A bond was formed through marriage so in August

I go visit the graves for the Festival of the Dead. Going from the bullet train

To the Chugoku Highway, I move farther and farther away

Summer - Óndra Łysohorsky

A rocky slope, all overgrown with pine trees

Looks musing down the frothy Ostravitsa.

The summer ripens. Through the crowded branches

The midday sun drifts onto tallgrown grasses.

I will flee to my Helper - Yose ben Yose

                    א

¹ Let me flee to my Helper

I will find (Him) right in front of me

God is close to me

whenever I call out with (my) voice.

 

The Sky - Gareth Culshaw

When the cauliflowers have left the sky

leaving us with mushroom grey,

the birds sing songs we knew when young.

Work Shy - Gerard Fanning

When Don Givens made off with a treble clef

from the USSR’s hammer and sickle,

I was skiving off with the backroom boys,

though in truth it could hardly have been me

Somehow - Hsia Yü

She took a fan and painted a bird on one side

And a cage on the other and then she spun

The handle in her hand till we could see the bird

In the cage and then she put the fan away and smiling

Asked us what we thought it was she’d said

Hiyam - Zeina Hashem Beck

My grandmother, Hiyam, whose name

means love, had none, gave none. Locked

her refrigerator door so her children wouldn’t

make a mess in the kitchen, sat them down,

And I dreamt that I was a tree - Claribel Alegría

And I dreamt that I was a tree

and all my branches – leafy –

were belovéd of the birds

Shadow of The Light - Iliana Villanueva

The fountain illuminates pigeons and pigeons

pigeons about to say

volatile with sayings

white from their intense violence.

1932 - Jackson

reading the poems of women

born the same year as my mother

The Poet - Hatif Janabi

The poet is bewitched by light and darkness,

by a dagger that delights in misery

by wind and ruin and echo

by a ravenous temptation.

I draw the curtains of the afternoon - Luís Carlos Patraquim

I draw the curtains of the afternoon

because I desire your fullness

Cage - Teresa Colom

My father found a canary in the snow.

We put it into a cage.

One of its legs, instead of claws, had only a stump.

Dismissed by God’s Laugh - Don Carson

The powers of darkness descended in hate,

Maliciously, leeringly trying to bait

Their Victim, Creator, this self-emptied Man,

Committed to wrecking their Maker’s bold plan.

Ovaria - Tjawangwa Dema

i

When midnight comes

I find I have been away too long

Blowing my insides upside down

Still they say hope is on the way - Becki Friend

Yesterday I felt myself

begin to die,

shadows behind my eyes

stretched between

a deepening green

April - Bùi Chát

Bouts of rain drop on people’s heads

Wetness that changes lives

Lots of folks don’t know where to take refuge

Dragonflies - Asmaa Azaizeh

Millions of years ago, there were no winged creatures.

We all crawled around on our bellies and paws

to arrive.

A Homeland - Mohammed J. Al-Nabhan

My Homeland!

Would a homeland abolish a loved one's name?

Red tape all his civil documents

Or cross-out with red ink the names of its people?

Urgent Mail - Ali Al Jallawi

He was no more than a courier

On his back a sack of letters

He had a bicycle

A route

And a cap

He was no more than a courier

Palm Sunday - Malcolm Guite

Now to the gate of my Jerusalem,

The seething holy city of my heart,

The saviour comes. But will I welcome him?

The Myracle of the Toothpiks - Jorge Canese

If time doesn’t exist, what is it that repeats itself so?

That there’s no danger - Eduardo Milán

That there’s no danger,

that the word stays intact

outside the person, by their side.

untitled - Eiríkur Örn Norðdahl

I died but now I live for

ages of ages

and hold the keys of hell and death

The room - Jessie Kleemann

In the silent grey darkness of the room

you stand

like a ghost by the window beside my bed

acting like a dead with my already stiff limbs

that has become blue beating forth and back

and searching after my body

A Journey - Jovanka Uljarević

I am not here where you see me

or there where they know me

There is here for me

And here is too far

This Thick Sound (v1.1) - Kenneth Krabat

There is an eternal humm of work to København

take away the sound of high voltage for street lamps

and for shop lighting and converters for all things hidden

In the now and here - Michael Theophilus Dom

Thoughts in a day

Are a measure

Acts are of being,

Etched in its matrix,

As you and I are.

Ecstasy - Marie Under

Ah, earthly life burns in myriad splendours

Not even death’s dark hazard can destroy.

I yield, a willing prisoner, to joy;

I never sorted with discreet pretenders.

Dead Flowers - Sidonie Grünwald-Zerkovitz

In the vase on the sill your roses lie

Looking, now, wilted and dead

Once, resplendently charming the eye

In white and crimson red.

Reading Flyers - Mtendere Alice Kishindo

I demand,

Not ask,

I seek,

Yet, denied all that I find.

You Will Never Return - Miguel Caló and Osmar Maderna

When she said goodbye, I wanted to cry

then without her love, I wanted to scream.

Second Tongue - Gearóid MacLochlainn

I am the tongue

in the kidnapper’s sack.

What it is - Erich Fried

It is nonsense

says reason

It is what it is

says love

Mother is Gold - Laju Ereyitomi Oyewoli

Iya ni wura

Mother is Gold

A Treasure untold

Gifted to the Human race

To soften life’s arduous task 

In the Evening - Ugo Foscolo

Maybe because you are the image of eternal peace

O evening, you are welcomed by me with open arms

when the summer clouds and the gentlest breeze

Consecrating the Alphabet - Leonor Scliar Cabral

ALEF

Horns rise up with force, igneous, aglow,

to burst apart the mysteries of time,

while a scribe revives prophecies divine 

on pure papyrus, salvaged long ago.

Iconic Existence - Roula-Maria Dib

Keep her locked in an eternal smile, that loving gaze

you see in your mind’s mined cave deep within your Self,

or in the symbol on the solid wooden surface.

Let her sing, but from her nether-world into yours.

Metaphors - Idriss Allouch

I guess

What happens around me

The effect of something borrowing

The language of another reality

My Cacti - Delno L.A. Tromp

Cacti, my passion,

Allow me to caress you

Supper With Poppies - Dostena Angelova-Lavergne

one day lies will sparkle

like crushed puppies

and they won’t be lies

just crushed poppies sparkling.

Strike the chords softly - Pamelia Sarah Yule

Strike the chords softly with tremulous fingers, 

While, on the threshold of happiest years, 

For a brief moment fond memory lingers. 

Ere we go forth to life's conflicts and fears! 

Go Spread Wings - John Agard

If I be the rain

you the earth

let love be the seed

Sin - Forugh Farrokhzad

I have sinned a rapturous sin

in a warm enflamed embrace,

sinned in a pair of vindictive arms,

arms violent and ablaze.

I Abandoned Her and I Didn’t Know - José Canet

Kneaded between the silver and gold

of serenades

and wild dance parties,

cradled by the sounds

of bandoneons,

this tango was born.

She Has Wilted Early - Julia Boutros

This flower … 

has wilted early, 

she’s still pretty, 

she’s still very pretty

There Was a Jolly Miller - Isaac Bickerstaffe

There was a jolly miller once lived on the river Dee;

He danced and sang from morn till night, no lark so blithe as he;

On Julia's Death - Vasily Kapnist

The evening darkness shrouds 

The slumbering world in peace. 

And from her throne of clouds 

Shines Luna through the trees. 

A story of the great men of the faith - Saadi Shirazi

They relate a story of the great men of the faith. 

Recognizers of the truth of the essence of truth. 

Peace - Kewulay Kamara

Good evening people,

Good evening people

Mother - Ki Hyung-do

Mother

Is not coming home. She left

for the market, carrying on her head thirty 

stems of young radish to sell. She’s not

coming home. The sun has long

Set. I sit in the room like

A cold ball of uneaten rice in a bowl.

Bengali women - Joie Bose

perhaps it is how we were raised

always asked to keep our spine straight

to hold our heads high

On Easter - August Šenoa

On Easter back then, even now I recall,

The morning sun did toward us veer,

Full of life, of youth, I ran to you all,

Toward my village small and so dear.

Fire - Kwame Dawes

He is the man with the axe with its white edge.

He was born to a time of fire.

He took a pickaxe and walked to the rail

track and asked for work; and he stood

by the sparks and forging fire, standing

there as if the heat is food, pure food.

Elsie - Pamela Claire Mordecai

Elsie could cuss like a sailor

rip masts too when she swept

like a storm upgrading

minute by minute trading

The gloomy night to morning yields - Hans Chrestensen Sthen

The gloomy night to morning yields,

So brightly the day is breaking;

The sun ascends over hills and fields,

And birds are with song awaking.

The Survivor - Tadeusz Różewicz

I am twenty-four

led to slaughter

I survived.

Social media love - Pamela Elizabeth Acaye

Babes, Please I beg, Let us not waste time on grammar!

The time between is too short to waste on long words,

Ecstasy - Paul Éluard

I am in front of this feminine land

Like a child in front of the fire

Smiling vaguely with tears in my eyes

a tribute to emily dickinson - Piotr Kostousov

I swap my freedom like a coin

for paths and springs and groves,

Ortamezar - Ivan Theofilov

The neighborhood

with its shady provincial courtyards

next to the hot watermelon fields,

Silence Number 1, Begetting - Marie-Andree Auclair

silence is stone

polished smooth

The Vanity of the World (Miranda Vanitas) - Bernard of Clairvaux

O the wondrous vanity 

That the heart bewitches! 

Bitter poison 'tis to be 

All absorbed in riches. 

The Sower - Edward Dowden

Son of the earth, brave flinger of the seed,

Strider of furrows, copesmate of the morn,

Which, stirr’d with quickenings of a day unborn,

Cinderalla - Chinedu Okezuonu

This ugly sight of yours

Knives my soft conscience

Melts the grease inside my knuckles.

The Hymn of Slippers - Rati Saxena

The taste is very bitter, from tongue to throat,

up to the intestine, bitterness everywhere

everything is bitter, 

Weave your joy - Philo Ikonya

With the tips of your fingers

And all of you like the

Orchestra conductor knows that music

Know your body:

Its heart drum

Piano toes…

Spring - Cathal O’Byrne

A slender blade of grass beside a. stone,

A gleam of sunshine ’tween the narrow roofs,

an old man - Alexandru Vakulovski

an old man

paralysed on one side

of his body

is carrying

a bucket to the bin

Where'er I go - Carl Olof Rosenius

Where'er I go, in mountains, woods, or valleys,

With me goes a Friend, I hear His voice,

Warns me, though invisible, and peace He grants me,

Rewind - Steinun Helgadóttir

Rewind.

Eyes fixed

on

widelenshorison

hands

an icelandic economist in soho - Sjón

orange tents

sprout up

around the pub

Italian for Farouters - Tiziana Colusso

My tongue is burnt by vanities:

parasemantic epidemics

stick to my palate

exhaling from the daily ink,

Karkhiyya - Abu Nuwas

Praise the wine for its munificence

And give it the best of names

Confidentially - Peyo Yavorov

‘Neath tender enchantments of a dreamy evening

And the two of us burning – don’t come too close.

Mortuos voco - Putinas

But silence shrouds the grave-yard on the hill. 

No corpse stirs from its damp and earthly cell. 

I leave thee not - Wolfgang Christoph Dessler

I leave thee not, thou art my Jesus ever,

Though earth rebel,

And death and hell

Would, from its steadfast hold, my faith dissever;

Long life with peace - Xasan Sheekh Muumin

Long life with peace, long life with peace

Long life with peace, long life with peace

Vivos plango - Putinas

Now I depart. With benedictory grace

A world of silence summons me to go,

I feel the gentle shroud of endless space,

The Night that soothes and softens all our woe.

In the Circle of the Veranda, 15 - Ivar Ivask

This tiny watch will soon have measured

its century. An heirloom of Father's sister Adelheid.

Frozen Jews - Avrom Sutzkever

Did you ever see in fields of snow

Frozen Jews, in row upon row?

The Will to Life - Abu al-Qasim al-Shabbi

If, one day, the people wills to live

Then fate must obey

Darkness must dissipate

And must the chain give way

Before the Melbourne Reading - Norman Erikson Pasaribu

​You spent

the entire morning

digging

out the online dictionaries

Infinite Love - Søren Kierkegaard

Thou loving Father, 

everything goes wrong for me

and yet Thou art love. 

Life is Short - Francisco Gorrindo

Let’s see, boys—I want to be joyful,

I want to be dazed, so I don’t have to think.

The Conversation - Loidology

Come sit here dear,

Come tell me about that gloomy face you wear.

Because the melancholy i can no longer bear.

Let us put all things clear.

Lately you jeer every time i come near,

It seems it is me you fear.

The Prayer of the Little Bird - Carmen Bernos de Gasztold

Dear God,

I don't know how to pray by myself

very well,

Curling her tail - Mimi Khalvati

Curling her tail

      and staring

I am like a slip of comet - Gerard Manley Hopkins

— I am like a slip of comet,

Scarce worth discovery, in some corner seen

Bridging the slender difference of two stars,

How a Dragon is Born - Gueorgui Konstantinov

The beginning is a fight

Between the falling cross

Of a bird

And a serpent,

From the Bridge - Claribel Alegría

I have freed myself at last

it has been hard to break free

near the end of the bridge

I pause

the water flows below

The Eye of Poetry - Lilian A. Aujo

Poetry is the school I will never graduate from

because no matter how hard – I try

I will never tell it all – the secret way of its patterns

And how the same letters form different syllables to form different words,

And how they fall – in front or behind one another, and if re-arranged would create a whole different story...

I love you, my gentle one - Ralph Bitamazire

I love you, my gentle one;

My love is the fresh milk in the rubindi

Which you drank on the wedding day;

A Sudden Storm - Pius Oleghe

The wind howls; the trees sway,

The loose housetop sheets clatter and clang; 

The open window shuts with a bang,

And the sky makes night of day.

A godlike man - Narsimha Mehta

A godlike man is one,

Who feels another’s pain

Who shares another’s sorrow,

And pride does disdain.

Haidouks - Hristo Botev

Father and Son

Come, Grandfather, blow on your pipe now,

And I will take up the tune

With songs of our heroes, of haidouks,

Songs of voivodes, of chieftains,

Of Chavdar the terrible haidouk,

Of Chavdar the captain of old,

The son of Petko the Fearsome!

Monolog of an Effigy - Yevgeny Yevtushenko

When my charitable fellow-writers

               were burning my effigy

and not poking my guts with their pocket-knives —

                    thank God!

Guard Duty - Tomas Tranströmer

I’m ordered out to a big hump of stones

as if I were an aristocratic corpse from the Iron Age.

The rest are still back in the tent sleeping,

stretched out like spokes in a wheel.

i am the richest - Dhal Jirel 'Ravi'

I have a couple of feet

My hut and my rugs

I eat cheap bread and laugh at Fate

I toil through the livelong day

Report me to you - Robert Wever

Now I beshrew his herte, that to that wyll not agree,

But yet because the tyme shall not seme very longe,

Or eate we departe, let vs haue a mery songe

The sing as folow'eth.

Yogyakarta - Albert Hagenaars

The line from the volcano’s summit

past the sultan’s palace to the sea’s abyss

spans the sacred space of the culture

in which until the end you are embedded.

If I Could Only Write - Ramón de Campoamor

“And will you write a letter for me, padre?”—

  “Yes, child—no need to tell me the address!”

“Do you know whom it’s for because on that dark evening

        You saw us walking?”—“Yes.”

 

The Inquiry - John Dyer

Ye poor little sheep! Ah! well may ye stray,

While sad is your shepherd, and Clio away!

Tell where have you been; have you met with my love,

On the mountain, or valley, or meadow, or grove?

Alas-a-day! No — ye are starv'd and half dead;

Ye saw not my love, or ye all had been fed.

Of the voice of things – Fiama Hasse Pais Brandão

Only the wind’s blast

gives lyrical sound

to the windmill’s blades.

The Journey Prayer - Brendan of Clonfert

God, bless to me this day,

God bless to me this night;

Bless, O bless, Thou God of grace,

Each day and hour of my life;

Our Assorted Quarantines - Elizabeth Kate Switaj

I’m running thirty miles of quarantine with wandering pigs and semi

-feral dogs. Beach and coral and islets complete

the two-lane road’s atoll. You said that you were strangely proud

A north-country song - Anonymous

Says t'auld man tit oak tree,

Young and lusty was I when I kenn'd thee;