O God, my heart is dreadful. How can I revive it?
Who can lull and calm down my heart?
The sound of arrogance is deafening my ear today,
I would have talked to it had I not had self-praise.
Strange my heart has become when in love.
Pure love it is, anyone to perceive?
I have become flabbergast at my ordeal,
I conceal none of my love fears.
I ask God to inspire me.
Do I have a living heart or should I lament its death?
In honor of the German holiday, Three Kings Day, we present this work by one of Medeival Germany’s most significant poets.
If one can save one’s soul by lying,
Then I know someone who is holy.
He has often sworn false oaths to me.
His shrewd cunning overwhelmed me
And I chose him as a friend.
I thought I had found in him constancy.
But my own good sense deserted me,
As I now announce to the world:
He is as free of duplicity
As the sea is free of waves.
Why should I seek help from others
Since it was my own heart that deceived me?
It led me to the one
Who is worthless to me or to any good woman.
It hardly honors men
How this man conducts himself with regard to women.
He is so well versed in uttering sweet phrases
That one could not write them down.
I followed them even onto slippery ice.
Now I am suffering the harm they caused.
If I were now to begin to detest all men,
I would do so out of hatred of him alone.
But how are they all at fault for this?
Many men show better gratitude to their ladies.
One lady, by using her good sense,
Chose a friend who makes her happy.
She is laughing while I am sad.
Our lives play themselves out quite differently.
I have begun with suffering.
May God, the mighty One, ease my pain.
scattering seeds
on the earth
ripening fruits
piling up fallen leaves
these are also events
on the sky
I fell in love with you, just when had seen you, dearest,
I still recall the simplest talk around us,
You were just one the mute, and speech of fire, fierce,
In lost of sounds words, were send me by your eyes.
Days by the days were sunk. The year had passed since then.
And spring is sending us its living rays, once more,
The flowers are set in fairy dress again,
But I’m? I’m still in love with you as was before.
And you’re, as in the past, the silent one and sad;
Only your look sometimes is glowing and speaking,
Not in such way, sometimes, the moon – an empress, great, –
Is hiding her bright face behind a mound, pricking? –
Yet, and behind the rock, with her forehead inclined,
From darkness, narrow, she sheds the gorgeous light.
Blow high, blow low,
O wind from the West;
You come from the country
I love the best.
O say have the lilies
Yet lifted their heads
Above the lake-water
That ripples and spreads?
Do the little sedges
Still shake with delight,
And whisper together
All through the night?
Have the mountains the purple
I used to love,
And peace about them,
Around and above?
Ah, Grief, I should not treat you
like a homeless dog
who comes to the back door
for a crust, for a meatless bone.
I should trust you.
I should coax you
into the house and give you
your own corner,
a worn mat to lie on,
your own water dish.
You think I don’t know you’ve been living
under my porch.
You long for your real place to be readied
before winter comes. You need
your name,
your collar and tag. You need
the right to warn off intruders,
to consider
my house your own
and me your person
and yourself
my own dog.
We present this work in honor of the poet’s 140th birthday.
Be safe, O Egypt; I will sacrifice
There is my hand for you, if the world raised a hand to hurt you
Never you shall yield, ever
I am hoping for tomorrow to be better
My heart and my determination are with me for strife
And to my heart, O Egypt, you are a faith, in addition to my religion
Safety for you, O Egypt
And peace, O my homeland
If the world threw arrows at you
I would shield you by my heart
And be safe in all times
I am an Egyptian, built by the founders of the
everlasting pyramid, who defeated doom
The pyramids stand beside us
Against the world’s arrogance, is as my stand
In my defense and struggle for my country
I do not turn away, tire, or yield
Safety for you, O Egypt
And Peace, O my homeland
If the world threw arrows at you
I would shield you by my heart
And be safe in all times
Hey, you who are trying to chain our orbits
There is no star in the sky under your control
The homeland of freemen is a sky that cannot be possessed
And the freemen own its horizons
There is no enemy that can attack you, O land of Egypt
We are all for your protection
Safety for you, O Egypt
And Peace, O my homeland
If the world threw arrows at you
I would shield you by my heart
And be safe in all times
To highness, O sons of Egypt, to highness
And honor the future by Egypt
The whole world is to save our Egypt, because
we put our country’s sake first
My left side has my heart
And my homeland is the heart of my right side
Safety for you, O Egypt
And Peace, O my homeland
If the world threw arrows at you
I would shield you by my heart
And be safe in all times
We present this work in honor of New Year’s Eve.
Should auld acquaintance be forgot,
And never brought to mind?
Should auld acquaintance be forgot,
And auld lang syne!
For auld land syne, my dear,
For auld lang syne,
We’ll tak a cup o’ kindness yet,
For auld lang syne.
And surely ye’ll be your pint stowp!
And surely I’ll be mine!
And we’ll tak a cup o’ kindness yet,
For auld lang syne.
For auld land syne, my dear,
For auld lang syne,
We’ll tak a cup o’ kindness yet,
For auld lang syne.
We twa hae run about the braes,
And pou’d the gowans fine;
But we’ve wander’d mony a weary fit
Sin’ auld lang syne.
For auld land syne, my dear,
For auld lang syne,
We’ll tak a cup o’ kindness yet,
For auld lang syne.
We twa hae paidl’d in the burn,
Frae morning sun till dine;
But seas between us briad hae roar’d
Sin’ auld lang syne.
For auld land syne, my dear,
For auld lang syne,
We’ll tak a cup o’ kindness yet,
For auld lang syne.
And there’s a hand, my trusty fere!
And gie’s a hand o’ thine!
And we’ll tak’ a right gude-willie waught,
For auld lang syne.
For auld land syne, my dear,
For auld lang syne,
We’ll tak a cup o’ kindness yet,
For auld lang syne.
I take apart a rose and I don’t find you.
To the wind, thus, columns of floating petals,
the palace of the rose in ruins.
Now—impossible rose—you begin:
by needles of interwoven air
to the sea of the intact delight,
where all the roses of the world
—before they were a rose—
are beautiful without the prison of beauty.
We present this work in honor of the 125th anniversary of the poet’s death.
I tell my secret? No indeed, not I:
Perhaps some day, who knows?
But not today; it froze, and blows, and snows,
And you’re too curious: fie!
You want to hear it? well:
Only, my secret’s mine, and I won’t tell.
Or, after all, perhaps there’s none:
Suppose there is no secret after all,
But only just my fun.
Today’s a nipping day, a biting day;
In which one wants a shawl,
A veil, a cloak, and other wraps:
I cannot ope to everyone who taps,
And let the draughts come whistling thro’ my hall;
Come bounding and surrounding me,
Come buffeting, astounding me,
Nipping and clipping thro’ my wraps and all.
I wear my mask for warmth: who ever shows
His nose to Russian snows
To be pecked at by every wind that blows?
You would not peck? I thank you for good will,
Believe, but leave the truth untested still.
Spring’s an expansive time: yet I don’t trust
March with its peck of dust,
Nor April with its rainbow-crowned brief showers,
Nor even May, whose flowers
One frost may wither thro’ the sunless hours.
Perhaps some languid summer day,
When drowsy birds sing less and less,
And golden fruit is ripening to excess,
If there’s not too much sun nor too much cloud,
And the warm wind is neither still nor loud,
Perhaps my secret I may say,
Or you may guess.
Poets Corner 