Rublev - Rowan Williams

One day, God walked in, pale from the grey steppe,
slit-eyed against the wind, and stopped,
said, Colour me, breathe your blood into my mouth.

Poem For A Librarian - Mani Rao

Big library in our small town.
So many floors and wings,
We had three elevators and five stairwells.

A Disturbed Silence - Amha Asfaw

I lost my poems, my praise, my songs.
I lost my anger, my sorrow, my bitterness.

Nothing - Julia de Burgos

Since life is nothing in your philosophy,
let’s drink to the fact of not being our bodies.
Let's drink to the nothing of your sensual lips,
which are sensual zeros in your blue kisses:

The Cottage - Taras Shevchenko

Perhaps my mother prayerless trod
Nor knelt on my behalf to God,
But brought me up to what I am
As naturally as a lamb,

Pencil Letter - Irina Ratushinskaya

I know it won't be received
Or sent. The page will be
In shreds as soon as I have scribbled it.

I live with my Lord - Sheikh Ahmadou Bamba

In the name of Allah the Most Gracious, the Most Merciful

Thanks to the Quran, I live with my Lord, the Incomparable Auxiliary, I gained full control of my soul and expelled Satan, the outcast.

To Ulla - Carl Michael Bellman

Ulla, mine Ulla, tell me, may I hand thee
Reddest of strawberries in milk or wine?
Or from the pond a lively fish? Command me!

After life comes death - Dada Masiti

After life comes death
When the Shaikh dies, no one should weep
Write “in the name of God,”
For everything begins that way

Daughter of Locusts - Ribka Sibhatu

Locusts, darkened sky,
flayed earth. A mother
panting in bed.

Like Elephants - Gaamangwe Mogami

Before the sad years made homes in our bones,
And our blood turned into riots,
We hang our swelling breasts in the branches of mamma’s¹ morala tree,
And we sang old gospels to the humans sleeping thick in our ribs,
Yet to be born.

Perfectionist Farmer’s Daughter - Xiomara M. Cacho Caballero

You improve the value of the habitat
Intensifying from dawn your love for plants and flowers
intending to provide a solution to the Environmental footprint
capturing the carbon of the earth and the peace that
the flora provides you

Fishhawks - Anne Szumigalski

my son stands in waist-high water
the salt reddens his skin
out of his face spring wiry hairs
thickening to a beard
his arms have become wide and heavy

Sapadilli Tam - James Martinez

You want to hear of of w’at I know,
About de fish day tark of so,
De one dat people use to see,
Outside o’ Sapadilli Caye?

Lamp-Lit - Kisaka Ryo

I step into my apartment and first off
dart a look at the little lamp
on my answering-machine.

To the Venerable Virgin, Mariana De Jesús De Paredes Y Flores, Lily Of Quito - José Manuel Peramás

Virgin, the New World’s sweet pride and greatest glory,
Receive these Indian verses, which the poet renders to you,
coming from Quito’s boundary, with your pleasant demeanour

The Potatoes - Inge Pederson

Hospital. In sinking
yellow gardens. Water
stands still
under the trees.

Freedom Writers - Nimah Ismail Nawwab

The scribe’s spirit lifts
scenting the perfume of promising openness
taking a deep breath of tangy freshness
freedom of speech hailed in surprised jubilation

Ballad - Dan Andersson

My passion was born in the lusty spring
At the strand of the river tumbling blue.
Wild honey I drank in the years of my youth
In meadows drenched with midnight dew.

Listening to Mukesh - Pooja Nansi

Driving to your block,
I slide in my father’s cassette
of old Hindi songs and
I am humming in twilight
to the legendary
playback singer’s baritone

The Helmet And The Dandelion - Eduardas Miezelaitis

The Helmet And The Dandelion
Near a rotted old stump
Which the spring water washes
An old helmet rusts, gaunt,
And upon it, audacious,

Spring-Watching Pavilion - Hồ Xuân Hương

A gentle spring evening arrives
airily, unclouded by worldly dust.

It's morning and the sun carries naked treetops like antlers - Almin Kaplan

It's morning and the sun carries naked treetops like antlers

*
Trucks emerge from the night
And vanish into the day

Yesterday you fell asleep - Margarida Ferra

Yesterday you fell asleep, we
still had all the knives in our mouths,
three unused.