Diamond Speaks

We present this work in honor of the poet’s 480th birthday.

‘Tis not because my strength outranks both flame and brand,
Nor because my facets display a cunning hand,
Nor because, set in fine-wrought gold, I shine so bright,
Nor even that I’m pure, whiter than Phoebus’ light,
But rather because my form is a heart, like unto
My Mistress’ heart (but for hardness), that I’m sent to you.
For all things must yield to unfettered purity
And she is my true equal in each quality.
For who would fail to grant that once I had been sent,
My Mistress should thus, in turn, find favour and content?
May it please, from these omens I shall gather strength
And thus from Queen to equal Queen I’ll pass at length.
O would I could join them with an iron band alone
(Though all prefer gold) and unite their hearts as one
That neither envy, greed nor gossip’s evil play,
Nor mistrust, nor ravaging time could wear away.
Then they’d say among treasures I was most renowned,
For I’d have two great jewels in one setting bound.
Then with my glitt’ring rays I should confound the sight
Of all who saw me, dazzling enemies with my light.
Then, by my worth and by her art, I should be known
As the diamond, the greatest jewel, the mighty stone.

Look Up!

Look up! Our dawning day draws its first breath!
The world grows light! Our souls begin to glow!

No ranting shaykh rules from his pulpit throne.
No mosque hawks holiness it does not know.

No sham, no pious fraud, no priest commands!
The turban’s knot cut to its root below!

No more conjurations! No spell! No ghosts!
Good riddance! We are done with folly’s show!

The search of truth shall drive out ignorance.
Equality shall strike the despots low.

Let warring ways be banished from the world.
Let justice everywhere its carpet throw.

May friendship ancient hatred reconcile.
May love grow from the seed of love we sow!

Translation by Amin Banani with Jascha Kessler

Confinement

We have become eagles
who glaze over the information peaks
from sunrise to sunset
trumpeted in all languages, in colors,
in plumes of sweetness and vigor
masters of the dreamlike airs…

Today we are lions
who roar their fury of life
or spread out, troubled in the sunlight
of their screens, watching the family
of the world, waiting for the best
and theories in the wind

But who would have believed it?
by the glow of virtual campfires
for a reconstructed holiday,
the shadows of the past took pity
and before disappearing,
they turned us into griffins.

Fairy Song

We present this work in honor of the poet’s 190th birthday.

The moonlight fades from flower and rose
And the stars dim one by one;
The tale is told, the song is sung,
And the Fairy feast is done.
The night-wind rocks the sleeping flowers,
And sings to them, soft and low.
The early birds erelong will wake:
‘T is time for the Elves to go.

O’er the sleeping earth we silently pass,
Unseen by mortal eye,
And send sweet dreams, as we lightly float
Through the quiet moonlit sky;–
For the stars’ soft eyes alone may see,
And the flowers alone may know,
The feasts we hold, the tales we tell;
So’t is time for the Elves to go.

From bird, and blossom, and bee,
We learn the lessons they teach;
And seek, by kindly deeds, to win
A loving friend in each.
And though unseen on earth we dwell,
Sweet voices whisper low,
And gentle hearts most joyously greet
The Elves where’er they go.

When next we meet in the Fairy dell,
May the silver moon’s soft light
Shine then on faces gay as now,
And Elfin hearts as light.
Now spread each wing, for the eastern sky
With sunlight soon shall glow.
The morning star shall light us home:
Farewell! for the Elves must go.

Poem of Sorrow and Anger

My dwelling is often covered by frost and snow,
The foreign winds bring again spring and summer;

They gently blow into my robes,
And chillingly shrill into my ear;

Emotions stirred, I think of my parents,
Whilst I draw a long sigh of endless sorrows.

Whenever guests visit from afar,
I would often make joy of their tidings;

I lost no time in throwing eager questions,
Only to find that the guests were not from my home town.

Necessity

We present this work in honor of the poet’s 50th birthday.

I wear your perfume on my skin
Don’t be unkind
Like wild flowers shy under the sun
Don’t seek the truth,
I tell you none exists
Everything has an expiration date
Love, life, identity, even abnormality.
We are travelers,
Some of us just leave the suitcase at home
So that our hands won’t suffer the weight of our guilt.

The Street Before You Leave Tehran

We present this work in honor of the poet’s 45th birthday.

Facing the airport, all that’s now left in my grasp
is a crumpled land
that fits in the palm of my hand.

Facing wavering sunbeams—
a sun that is angry and mute.
All the way from the salt sands of Dasht-e Lut,
it came, the dream
that forced my fingers’ shift,
that set my teeth on edge.
A muted breeze,
whirlwind spun from sand dunes
all the way, even through the back alley.

Are you pasting together the cut-up fragments of my face to make me laugh?

No longer than the palm of the hand, a short leap,
exactly the length you had predicted.

A huge grave in which to lay the longest night of the year to sleep.

Sleep has quit our eyelids for other pastures,
has dropped its anchor at the shores of garden ponds,
has lost the chapped flaking of its lips,
poor thing.
Are you pasting together the cut-up fragments of my face to make me laugh?

With scissors – snip, snip – they are severing something.
The alphabet shavings strewn on the ground,
are they the letters that spell our family name?

With every zig-zag,
you cage my mother’s breath,
her footprints fading
in the shifting sands.

Are you pasting together the cut-up fragments of my face to make me laugh?
No.
A strange land-shape forms.
I will not return.
I left behind a shoe, one of a pair,
for you to put on and follow after me.

Translation by Franklin Lewis

Recreation

We present this work in honor of the 30th anniversary of the poet’s death.

Coming together
it is easier to work
after our bodies
meet
paper and pen
neither care nor profit
whether we write or not
but as your body moves
under my hands
charged and waiting
we cut the leash
you create me against your thighs
hilly with images
moving through our word countries
my body
writes into your flesh
the poem
you make of me.

Touching you I catch midnight
as moon fires set in my throat
I love you flesh into blossom
I made you
and take you made
into me.

Pakistan

We present this work in honor of the poet’s 80th birthday.

Mamoni Raisom Goswami
Indian
1942 – 2011

Oh Pakistan, celestial land!
Give us your heart!
And take our heart in return!
Once we shared the same sky!
Sky with the same sun!
We shared the same pain like twins on the battlefield
to remove the dust.

Now our flesh is ripped apart
By that meandering barbed-wire fence!
Oh they have drawn that
dividing line on a flimsy paper!
That line of agony and tears
Can anyone draw that line
In our raw flesh, inside our heart?

Friends! Be happy where you
are… now!
Memory never fades, poets say
distance only purifies it…
We sat under the same tree,
Enjoyed the fragrance of the
same flower
Till that time
like a dagger
cut those rivers into
several pieces! Destroyed the
mountains and flower gardens where
we had played!

And those banks
where we had counted those
fig-coloured waves!
Like the honey laden
lips of the damsels!
We wore the same clothes
woven by our mothers!
We shivered in winter and in summer our
sweat slid down our backs

We enjoyed the same wine
from the poems of Ghalib
Momin and Zauk
We cried together in pain!
Under the blood stained sky.

Oh Pakistan! Celestial land
Give us your heart
And take our heart in return!
No we need not speak now
Only silence speaks in a clear voice.
Oh Pakistan! Silence can bring
the fragrance of a mother’s soul
Silence can reveal.
The heavenly beauty of Sutlej,
Chenab, and the Red River
Of the East!
Silence can be loud like
a million voices
Oh Pakistan! Celestial land!
Our eyes misted by the
Smoke of blossoming gun powder!
Our soul wounded by the unknown fires!
May these eyes now witness the
new Sunrise
On the banks of Sutlej,
Chenab, and in the Red
River of the East!
Oh Pakistan, celestial land!
Give us your heart!
And take our heart in return

Five Days and Nights

We present this work in honor of the 50th anniversary of the poet’s death.

(on the death of Lenin)

Before they closed him in the tomb
lost to the light of day,
five days and nights stretcht in the room
of pillars still he lay.

The people filed in an endless train
with flags borne low at rest
to see his sallowing profile again
and the medal red on his chest.

And over the earth that he’d forsaken
so fierce a frost held sway
it seemed that he had surely taken
part of our warmth away.

Five nights in Moscow no one slept
because to sleep he had gone.
Close watch the sentinel moon kept,
solemn and wan.

Translation by Jack Lindsay

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