Ode to mediocrity - Eqrem Basha

We the mediocre

Were born somewhere in the middle

Cried in mezza voce

Were wrapped in medium-quality swaddling clothes

Neither expensive

Nor cheap

Descendants - Elisaveta Bagyrana

No portraits of my grandfathers are kept

fixed in a family picture-book.

I know nothing of the testaments they left,

The lives they led, their souls, their looks.

I question you - Abdallah Ag Alhousseyni

Ténéré, can you tell me of anything better

Than to have your friends and your mount,

And a brand new goatskin, watertight,

Fierce from love - Delmira Agustini

Made fierce by love, I’m starving for hearts.

Pigeon, vulture, dun deer or lion,

no meat tempts me more with exotic flavors.

Who will serve Thee? - Kabir

O Lord Increate, who will serve Thee?

Every votary offers his worship to the God of his own creation each day he receives service–

None seek Him, the Perfect: Brahma, the Indivisible Lord.

The Water Drop - José Emilio Pacheco

The water drop is a model of conciseness,

the entire universe

locked in a pin-point of water.

Letter From A Park - Otieno Amisi

I got your letter the other day

Sweet memories flooded my demented mind

recreated those sugary times no more shared

By the park ere we bade a tearful bye

I relived those endless nights

of wakeful emptiness

that threatened my sanity

I got your letter the other day.

Magic Moments - Jose Warden

Magic moments - are times remembered

Moments that are special not to be forgotten

Like, as a small child going home with a

Precious cargo in a small box.

Holding 6 day old chicks or ducklings'

Listening to their 'Cheep, cheep' or 'quack'.

Master builders all - J.L. Blackett

Each one or us a Master Builder is,

Each in his place pressing onward still

With main and might, with brawn and brain;

Each builds to spread the Nation‘s fame.

The Temple of Fragrance - Hồ Xuân Hương

Who could have fashioned this marvel?

The mountain cracks into a wide, hollow cave.

Flaw - Nadd Mahmud

I can’t promise that

I would always be there

each time you need me.

Three words of strength - Friedrich von Schiller

There are three lessons I would write, — 

Three words as with a burning pen, 

In tracings of eternal light. 

Upon the hearts of men.

Finlandia - Veikko Antero Koskenniemi

Finland, behold, thy daylight now is dawning,

the threat of night has now been driven away.

The May Star - Halldór Kiljan Laxness

Oh how light is thy shoe-sound

oh how long I abode thee

there is spring snow on window

bitter wind that whines

The Sound of the Wind - Porfirio Barba Jacob

The sound of the wind in the arcade

holds within it the key to myself:

I am a strengthened puissance,

I am a lamentation of the abyss.

Fast Phrases - Caroline Anande Uliwa

Sun bleached white door curtain invites rest,

To the hours spent on my butt now numb.

Ducks waddling defecating the backyard

Us on a mat them centimeters apart

Eight hands are expertly pinching extensions to my scalp

Island Treasure - Barbados! - Deighton R. Alleyne

​Beautiful Barbados, our tropical paradise

With grilled fish in Oistins, the food is nice

A Caribbean gem the place for leisure

See Harrison's Cave our national treasure.

a stone - Indah Widiastuti

A heart is sliding on a shiny surface

The pearl inside these eyes.

Can you see?

The Alleluiatic Sequence - Notker Balbulus

Come, let us all sing out the song of praise, 

Swelling in thanks to our eternal Lord, 

Alleluia!

The Fuzzy Wuzzy Angels - Bert Beros

Many a mother in Australia,

When the busy day is done,

Sends a prayer to the Almighty

For the keeping of her son,

The calves are everywhere - Gudugwe Mlilo

The Reverend Shepstone? Really!

The fence consumes the gourds!

Nihil - Frigyes Karinthy

Recitative

 

As a last act, I visited my former lover

And we had a conversation in the stairwell:

We went inside as the wind was savage

And heavy drops were falling.

 

from: Medea, Act 1 - Franz Grillparzer

Come! First the veil, and then the goddess' staff.

I shall not need them more; here let them rest.

Dark night, the time for magic, is gone by,

And what is yet to come, or good or ill,

Must happen in the beamy light of day.

The legend of Sargon - Anonymous

Sargon, the mighty king, king of Agade, am I.

My mother was a high priestess, my father I knew not. 

The brothers of my father loved the hills.

The answer - Jalal al-Din Rumi

"Allah, Allah!" cried the sick man, racked with pain the long night through; 

Till with prayer his heart grew tender, till his lips like honey grew.

Nocturne - Eino Leino

The corncrake's song rings in my ears,

above the rye a full moon sails;

this summer night all sorrow clears

and woodsmoke drifts along the dales,

I do not laugh or grieve, or sigh;

Child of war - Salomėja Nėris

O child of war, preserve your weapon,

For future children let it stay,

For they will come and ask their question

What was the world like in our day?