Fritz Perls: Gestalt Prayer

I do my thing and you do your thing
I am not in this world to
live up to your expectations,
and you are not in this world to
live up to mine.
You are you
and I am I
and if by chance

we find each other, it's beautiful.

If not, it can’t be helped.

Fritz Perls: Gestalt Gebet

Ich lebe mein Leben und du lebst dein Leben.

Ich bin nicht auf dieser Welt, um deinen Erwartungen zu entsprechen –

und du bist nicht auf dieser Welt, um meinen Erwartungen zu entsprechen.

ICH BIN ich und DU BIST du –

und wenn wir uns zufällig treffen und finden, dann ist das schön,

wenn nicht, dann ist auch das gut so.

Csukás István: Szerelmes vers

Ülj ide mellém s nézzük együtt
az utat, mely hozzád vezetett.
Ne törődj most a kitérőkkel,
én is úgy jöttem, ahogy lehetett.
Hol van már, aki kérdezett és
hol van már az a felelet –
leolvasztotta a nap
a hátamra fagyott teleket.
Zötyögtette a szívem, de most szeretem
az utat, mely hozzád vezetett.

Jacques Prévert: Immense et rouge

Immense et rouge
Au-dessus du Grand Palais
Le soleil d'hiver apparaît
Et disparaît
Comme lui mon coeur va disparaître
Et tout mon sang va s'en aller
S'en aller à ta recherche
Mon amour
Ma beauté
Et te trouver
Là où tu es.

Laura Castillo: Dos

Tengo dos camas

y dos cuartos

dos diferentes casas

dos papás

y dos mamás.

Tengo dos ojos

y dos manos

dos pies

y dos brazos

pero no puedo estar

en dos sitios diferentes

a la misma vez.

Laura Castillo: Two

I have two beds

and two bedrooms

Two different houses

Two fathers

and two mothers.

I have two eyes

And two hands

Two feet

And two arms

But I cannot be

In two different places

At the same time.

Mario Benedetti: Új, óceánközi csatorna

Javaslom, építsünk magunknak
akadály- és
kifogásmentes csatornát,
ahol végre
szót érthetne
a te Atlanti pillantásod
az én Csendes
természetemmel.

Gioconda Belli: De la mujer al hombre

Dios te hizo hombre para mí.
Te admiro desde lo más profundo
de mi subconsciente
con una admiración extraña y desbordada
que tiene un dobladillo de ternura.
Tus problemas, tus cosas
me intrigan, me interesan
y te observo
mientras discurres y discutes
hablando del mundo
y dándole una nueva geografía de palabras
Mi mente esta covada para recibirte,
para pensar tus ideas
y darte a pensar las mías;
te siento, mi compañero, hermoso
juntos somos completos
y nos miramos con orgullo
conociendo nuestras diferencias
sabiéndonos mujer y hombre
y apreciando la disimilitud
de nuestros cuerpos.

Forrest Gander: Scaffolding and Wind

The child showed what she
learned in school today.
Guess what this is she said
cracking both hands together
over her father's head
and running her fingers lightly
down the sides of his face.
"An egg?" he said.
No, your heart.

Carl Sandburg: Choose

The single clenched fist lifted and ready,

Or the open asking hand held out and waiting                          

Choose: 

For we meet by one or the other.

Buda Ferenc: Homo homini lupus

Mióta világ a világ,
főbe a fejsze belevág,
ember embernek farkasa,
öröktől ádáz ordasa.

Ordasok bár a farkasok,
hozzánk képest irgalmasok,
egymáshoz jók, hűségesek,
okosak, illedelmesek,
nem ölnek, csak ha éhesek.

Persze megesik, szentigaz:
köztük is gonoszra akadsz,
hisz néha – gondolj csak bele! –
farkas farkasnak embere.

Howard Nemerov: Mert rákérdeztél a vers és próza közti különbségre

Fecskék csipedtek, szitált az eső,
lested, hogy dermed pehellyé a csepp:
fátyolfüggönyön lebbenő,
ezüstből fehérbe kavargó balett.

Eltűnődtél, cseppek-e vagy pelyhek
- s ekkor zuhantukban szárnyra keltek.

Hafiz: The Sun Never Says

Even
After
All this time
The sun never says to the earth,

“You owe
Me.”

Look
What happens
With a love like that,
It lights the
Whole
Sky.

Alden Nowlan: It's Good To Be Here

I'm in trouble, she said
to him. That was the first
time in history that anyone
had ever spoken of me.

It was 1932 when she
was just fourteen years old
and men like him
worked all day for
one stinking dollar.

There's quinine, she said.
That's bullshit, he told her.

Then she cried and then
for a long time neither of them
said anything at all and then
their voices kept rising until
they were screaming at each other
and then there was another long silence and then
they began to talk very quietly and at last he said
well, I guess we'll just have to make the best of it.

While I lay curled up,
my heart beating,
in the darkness inside her.

Don Herold o Nadine Stair: Instants

(poem attributed to  Jorge Luis Borges)

If I could live again my life,
In the next - I'll try,
- to make more mistakes,
I won't try to be so perfect,
I'll be more relaxed,
I'll be more full - than I am now,
In fact, I'll take fewer things seriously,
I'll be less hygenic,
I'll take more risks,
I'll take more trips,
I'll watch more sunsets,
I'll climb more mountains,
I'll swim more rivers,
I'll go to more places - I've never been,
I'll eat more ice creams and less (lime) beans,
I'll have more real problems - and less imaginary
ones,
I was one of those people who live
prudent and prolific lives -
each minute of his life,
Offcourse that I had moments of joy - but,
if I could go back I'll try to have only good moments,

If you don't know - thats what life is made of,
Don't lose the now!

I was one of those who never goes anywhere
without a thermometer,
without a hot-water bottle,
and without an umberella and without a parachute,

If I could live again - I will travel light,
If I could live again - I'll try to work bare feet
at the beginning of spring till
the end of autumn,
I'll ride more carts,
I'll watch more sunrises and play with more children,
If I have the life to live - but now I am 85,
- and I know that I am dying ...

Mario Benedetti: Pausa

De vez en cuando hay que hacer
una pausa

contemplarse a sí mismo
sin la fruición cotidiana

examinar el pasado
rubro por rubro
etapa por etapa
baldosa por baldosa

y no llorarse las mentiras
sino cantarse las verdades.

Vera Pavlova: 91

dropped
and falling
from such
heights
for so
long
that
maybe
I will have
enough time
to learn
flying

Hal Sirowitz: The Benefits of Ignorance

If ignorance is bliss, Father said,
shouldn't you be looking blissful?
You should check to see if you have
the right kind of ignorance. If you're
not getting the benefits that most people
get from acting stupid, then you should
go back to what you always were—
being too smart for your own good.

Jorge Luis Borges: Parting

Three hundred nights like three hundred walls
must rise between my love and me
and the sea will be a black art between us.

Nothing will be left but memories.
O afternoons earned with suffering,
nights hoping for the sight of you,
fields along my way, firmament
that I am seeing and losing...
Final as marble
your absence will sadden other afternoons.

Translation from the spanish original found at:
http://spanishpoems.blogspot.hu/2006_12_01_archive.html?m=1

Bírtalan Ferenc: Míg megnövök

Engem ne emeljen a magasba senki,
ha nem tud addig tartani,
míg tényleg megnövök.
Guggoljon ide mellém,
ki nem csak hallani,
de érteni akar,
hogy közel legyen a szívdobogásunk.

Gerald Locklin: No Longer a Teenager

my daughter, who turns twenty tomorrow,
has become truly independent.
she doesn't need her father to help her
deal with the bureaucracies of school,
hmo's, insurance, the dmv.
she is quite capable of handling
landlords, bosses, and auto repair shops.
also boyfriends and roommates.
and her mother.

frankly it's been a big relief.
the teenage years were often stressful.
sometimes, though, i feel a little useless.

but when she drove down from northern California
to visit us for a couple of days,
she came through the door with the biggest, warmest hug in the world for me.
and when we all went out for lunch,
she said, affecting a little girl's voice,
"i'm going to sit next to my daddy,"
and she did, and slid over close to me
so i could put my arm around her shoulder
until the food arrived

i've been keeping busy since she's been gone,
mainly with my teaching and writing,
a little travel connected with both,
but i realized now how long it had been
since i had felt deep emotion.

when she left i said, simply,
"i love you,"
and she replied, quietly,
"i love you too."
you know it isn't always easy for
a twenty-year-old to say that;
it isn't always easy for a father.

literature and opera are full of
characters who die for love:
i stay alive for her.

Michael Glaviano: Untitled

what if we had as many
words for love as the inuits
have for snow
what if my heart pumped snow instead
of blood this love is soft and puffy don’t
slip on this love because it is packed hard as ice
this love is dry and crunchy this love is
wet and muddy this
love is ideal
for packing into
tidy rectangular prisms and
using to build the
igloo that we
will try hard to
melt from the
inside.

Charles Simic: Stone

Go inside a stone
That would be my way.
Let somebody else become a dove
Or gnash with a tiger’s tooth.
I am happy to be a stone.

From the outside the stone is a riddle:
No one knows how to answer it.
Yet within, it must be cool and quiet
Even though a cow steps on it full weight,
Even though a child throws it in a river;
The stone sinks, slow, unperturbed
To the river bottom
Where the fishes come to knock on it
And listen.

I have seen sparks fly out
When two stones are rubbed,
So perhaps it is not dark inside after all;
Perhaps there is a moon shining
From somewhere, as though behind a hill—
Just enough light to make out
The strange writings, the star-charts
On the inner walls.

Gioconda Belli: Parto

Me acuerdo
cuando nació mi hija.

Yo era un solo dolor miedoso,
esperando ver salir de entre mis piernas
un sueńo de nueve meses
con cara y sexo.

Izet Sarajlić: Luck in Sarajevo

In Sarajevo
in the spring of 1992,
everything is possible:

you go to stand in a bread line
and end up in an emergency room
with your leg amputated.

Afterwards, you still maintain
that you were very lucky.

(translated by Charles Simic)

Baranyi Ferenc: Körözvény

Ezerkilencszázhetvenkilenc
október tizenharmadikán
fölegyenesedett a kertben
és lopva szétnézett az apám.
Az ásót földbe ütve hagyta,
mintha csupán a boltba menne,
s mivel kezén is, homlokán is
zavarta őt a munka szennye:
megmosdózott a locsolónál
- nyitva maradt nyomán a vízcsap -
s úgy lopakodott ki a kertből,
mint aki percre távozik csak.
Aztán - mikor senki se látta -
egy alacsony felhőre lépett
és nekivágott kiskabátban
a magasságos őszi égnek,
amikor rájöttünk a cselre:
már nem tudtuk követni szemmel.
Fogják meg! Ott! A földi létből
kereket old egy öregember!

Hafiz: This Sky

This
Sky
Where we live
Is no place to lose your wings
So love, love
Love.

Wendy Cope: Two Cures For Love

1. Don't see him. Don't phone or write a letter.
2. The easy way: get to know him better.

Gustavo Alejandro Castiñeiras: Dime

Dime por favor donde no estás
en qué lugar puedo no ser tu ausencia
dónde puedo vivir sin recordarte,
y dónde recordar, sin que me duela.

Dime por favor en que vacío,
no está tu sombra llenando los centros;
dónde mi soledad es ella misma,
y no el sentir que tú te encuentras lejos.

Dime por favor por qué camino,
podré yo caminar, sin ser tu huella;
dónde podré correr no por buscarte,
y dónde descanzar de mi tristeza.

Dime por favor cuál es la noche,
que no tiene el color de tu mirada;
cuál es el sol, que tiene luz tan solo,
y no la sensación de que me llamas.

Dime por favor donde hay un mar,
que no susurre a mis oídos tus palabras.

Dime por favor en qué rincón,
nadie podrá ver mi tristeza;
dime cuál es el hueco de mi almohada,
que no tiene apoyada tu cabeza.

Dime por favor cuál es la noche,
en que vendrás, para velar tu sueño;
que no puedo vivir, porque te extraño;
y que no puedo morir, porque te quiero.

Joseph Brodsky: Belfast Tune

Here’s a girl from a dangerous town.
    She crops her dark hair short
so that less of her has to frown
    when someone gets hurt.

She folds her memories like a parachute.
    Dropped, she collects the peat
and cooks her veggies at home: they shoot
    here where they eat.

Ah, there’s more sky in these parts than, say,
    ground. Hence her voice’s pitch,
and her stare stains your retina like a gray
    bulb when you switch

hemispheres, and her knee-length quilt
    skirt’s cut to catch the squall.
I dream of her either loved or killed
    because the town’s too small.

Louise Glück: Unwritten Law

Interesting how we fall in love:
In my case, absolutely. Absolutely, and, alas, often--
so it was in my youth.
And always with rather boyish men--
unformed, sullen, or shyly kicking the dead leaves:
in the manner of Balanchine.
Nor did I see them as versions of the same thing.
I, with my inflexible Platonism,
my fierce seeing of only one thing at a time:
I ruled against the indefinite article.
And yet, the mistakes of my youth
made me hopeless, because they repeated themselves,
as is commonly true.
But in you I felt something beyond the archetype--
a true expansiveness, a buoyance and love of the earth
utterly alien to my nature. To my credit,
I blessed my good fortune in you.
Blessed it absolutely, in the manner of those years.
And you in your wisdom and cruelty
gradually taught me the meaninglessness of that term.

Baranyai Csaba: Elvesztettem

Hová lett?
Az előbb még itt volt.
Elgurulhatott, vagy mi.
Mint gumi, ruganyosan pattanhatott
Keresztül az asztal alatt
Egészen az ágy lábáig.
Onnan, gondolva egyet
Fel a csillárig,
Majd le az ablak párkányára
Végig le a fűbe
Emeleteket zuhanva
A többi közé
Megint
Elvesztettem.
Egy napot.

Az életemből.

Carrie Conners: The Joy of Sex

i like my body when it is with your
body. It is so quite new a thing.
—e.e. cummings

Killing time before a party, I open
my friend’s copy of The Joy of Sex

while she showers and find an e.e.
cummings poem that my ex used

to get me into bed. Despite fights
and his wholesome northern accent

those words made me flush, like they
were unbuttoning my shirt. Maybe

it’s the scent of my friend’s tea
rose shower gel, but now it all

seems too sweet, artificial as latex.
Chalk it up to bitterness (it’s been

a while) but thumbing through
the sketched characters with their

unlimited flexibility, their ability
to live upside-down without risk

of oxygen deficiency, the expert
instructions of how to rub what

and where that read like a car
owner’s manual make me

wonder how I ever fell in love
with a poem especially when

Amanda’s husband stares at Fox
News for hours every night instead

of watching her body unfold
like an arched wave nearing the shore

and gym-obsessed Eileen has
forgotten what the body is for

and I haven’t been really kissed
by a man in years, making me feel

very young and very old all at once like
the first time at anything always does.

Miriam Waddington: Someone Who Used To Have Someone

There used to be someone
to whom I could say do you
love me and be sure that the
answer would always be yes;
there used to be someone to
whom I could telephone and
be sure when the operator
said do you accept the charges
the answer would always be yes;
but now there is no one to ask
no one to telephone from the
strangeness of cities in the
lateness of nightness now there
is no-one always now no-one
no someone no never at all.

Can you imagine what it is
like to live in a world where
there is no-one now always no
no-one and never some some-
one to ask do you love me and
be sure that the answer would
always be yes? I live in a world
where only the billboards are
always they’re twenty feet tall
and they circle the city they
coax and caress me they heat
me and cool me they promise and
plead me with colour and comfort
you get to sleep with me
tonight (the me being ovaltine)
but who wants to get to sleep
with a cup of ovaltine what
kind of sleep is that for some-
one who used to have someone
to ask do you love me and
be sure that the answer
would always be yes?

Gioconda Belli: Sencillos Deseos

Hoy quisiera tus dedos escribiéndome historias en el pelo
y quisiera besos en la espalda
acurrucos
que me dijeras las mas grandes verdades
o las mas grandes mentiras
que me dijeras por ejemplo
que soy la mujer mas linda del mundo
que me querés mucho
cosas así
tan sencillas
tan repetidas,
que me delinearas el rostro
y me quedaras viendo a los ojos
como si tu vida entera dependiera de que los míos sonrieran
alborotando todas las gaviotas en la espuma.
Cosas quiero como que andes mi cuerpo
camino arbolado y oloroso,
que seas la primera lluvia del invierno
dejándote caer despacio
y luego en aguacero.
Cosas quiero como una gran ola de ternura
deshaciéndome
un ruido de caracol
un cardumen de peces en la boca
algo de eso
frágil y desnudo
como una flor a punto de entregarse a la primera luz de la mañana
o simplemente una semilla, un árbol
un poco de hierba
una caricia que me haga olvidar
el paso del tiempo
la guerra
los peligros de la muerte.

Ady Endre: The poet of the Hortobagy

He was a large-eyed, Hunnish youth,
smitten with many a fair mirage,
and with his herd he struck into
the famous Magyar Hortobágy.

Women and dreams have seized his soul
a thousand times with magic snare;
but when his heart would sprout a flower
the herds of cattle grazed it bare.

He often thought of wondrous things,
of wine and women, death and birth;
he could have been a holy bard
in any other land on earth.

But when he gazed upon the herds
and on the breeched, illiterate crowd,
straightway he buried all his songs;
he whistled or he swore aloud.

Nyerges, Anton N.

 

Eireann Corrigan: He Didn't Make the Greatest First Impression

My father doesn't dislike you because you're
Jewish. My father dislikes you because
you hurt me. Way back when I was a sophomore
still writing your name inside the cover of my
geometry book. In May, right after we first met
and I thought maybe you'd ask me to the junior
prom. My mom was already eyeing dresses and
trying out different kinds of braids in my hair. But she
was on some bus trip to Niagara Falls that weekend.
It was just me and my dad and he sat in the living
room with the newspaper while I was washing dishes
in the kitchen, on the phone with Paul Caldwell,
your friend, who later you'd argue was never
your friend, who told me I'm only telling you this
for your own good, but Dan told a bunch of us guys
that he thought you were too fat to take to the prom.
And that's when I bent over, holding on to the edge
of the kitchen sink, it hurt that badly and my father
came running in, convinced I had cut myself
on a steak knife or shattered a glass in my hand.
And I couldn't breathe enough to explain so he kept
prying my hands from my belly, checking my palms
and my shirt for blood. I'm sure he wished only
for one of my big sisters to glide in, but it was just my dad
and me that night and he did the best he could.
After I fell asleep doing sit-ups on the family room
floor, he carried me upstairs to bed and he must have been
cursing you the whole heavy trip up. And later
when they caught me hiding food, when my mom
would stand me on the scale and cry at the numbers —
Those mornings, when I would bundle up at five to run
he'd creep behind me in the station wagon in case I fell
and didn't get back up. Sometimes I'd make it
home just to faint in the shower and my dad had to
listen for that tumble and rush in to swing the faucet
from hot to cold. It didn't matter that you swore you never
said it, that instead of buying anyone a corsage, you hid
at your parents' beach house, burying empty bottles
in the sand. My dad couldn't have known that the mornings
he had to look at my naked body in the tub and anyway
he wouldn't have cared. By October, my spine was outlined
in bruises on my back with nothing to stop those bones
from rubbing against skin. Who else could he blame
for what I had done to myself? You were just a polite voice
on the telephone, always calling during supper, some snot-nosed
prep school punk. I was my father's littlest girl, his hell
on wheels, running away from him each morning,
just ahead of his headlights, around and around the block.

Leonard Cohen: How Could I Have Doubted

I stopped looking for you
I stopped waiting for you
I stopped dying for you
and I started dying for myself
I aged rapidly
I became fat in the face
and soft in the gut
and I forgot that I’d ever loved you
I was old
I had no focus, no mission
I wandered around eating and buying
bigger and bigger clothes
and I forgot why I hated
every long moment that was mine to fill
Why did you come back to me tonight
I can’t even get off this chair
Tears run down my cheeks
I am in love again
I can live like this

Ady Endre: A Hortobágy poétája

Kúnfajta, nagyszemű legény volt,
Kínzottja sok-sok méla vágynak,
Csordát őrzött és nekivágott
A híres magyar Hortobágynak.

Alkonyatok és délibábok
Megfogták százszor is a lelkét,
De ha virág nőtt a szivében,
A csorda-népek lelegelték.

Ezerszer gondolt csodaszépet,
Gondolt halálra, borra, nőre,
Minden más táján a világnak
Szent dalnok lett volna belőle.

De ha a piszkos, gatyás, bamba
Társakra s a csordára nézett,
Eltemette rögtön a nótát:
Káromkodott vagy fütyörészett.

Stephen Dunn: From the Manifesto of the Selfish

Because altruists are the least sexy people on earth, unable
to say “I want” without embarrassment,

we need to take from them everything they give,
then ask for more,

this is how to excite them, and because it’s exciting
to see them the least bit excited

once again we’ll be doing something for ourselves,
who have no problem taking pleasure,

always desirous and so pleased to be pleased, we who above all
can be trusted to keep the balance.

Ella Wheeler Wilcox: Winds of Fate

One ship drives east and another drives west,
With the self-same winds that blow,
’Tis the set of the sails
And not the gales
That tell them the way to go.
Like the winds of the sea are the winds of fate,
As we voyage along through life,
’Tis the set of the soul
That decides its goal
And not the calm or the strife.

Mario Benedetti: In defence of joy

Defend joy as a trench
defend it from scandal and routine
from misery and miserable
from temporary absences
and from definitive ones.

Defend joy as a principle
defend it from wonder and nightmares
from neutrals and neutrons
from sweet infamies
and serious diagnoses

Defend joy as a flag
defend it from ray and melancholy
from neives and rogues
from rhetoric and cardiac attacs
from endemics and academics

Defend joy as a destination
defend it from fire and firefighters
from suicidal and homicidal
from vacations and burden
from the obligation of being happy.

Defend joy as a certainty
defend it from oxide and dirt
from the famous brushwork of time
from dew and opportunism
from pimps of laughter

Defend joy as a Right
defend it from God and winter
from capital letters and death
from surnames and sorrows
from chance
                        and from joy itself.

Mario Benedetti: Defensa de la alegría

Defender la alegría como una trinchera
defenderla del escándalo y la rutina
de la miseria y los miserables
de las ausencias transitorias
y las definitivas

defender la alegría como un principio
defenderla del pasmo y las pesadillas
de los neutrales y de los neutrones
de las dulces infamias
y los graves diagnósticos

defender la alegría como una bandera
defenderla del rayo y la melancolía
de los ingenuos y de los canallas
de la retórica y los paros cardiacos
de las endemias y las academias

defender la alegría como un destino
defenderla del fuego y de los bomberos
de los suicidas y los homicidas
de las vacaciones y del agobio
de la obligación de estar alegres

defender la alegría como una certeza
defenderla del óxido y la roña
de la famosa pátina del tiempo
del relente y del oportunismo
de los proxenetas de la risa

defender la alegría como un derecho
defenderla de dios y del invierno
de las mayúsculas y de la muerte
de los apellidos y las lástimas
del azar
y también de la alegría.

Vera Pavlova: 64

I walk the tightrope.

A kid on each arm

for balance.

Ruth Feldman: Detour

I took a long time getting here,
much of it wasted on wrong turns,
back roads riddled by ruts.
I had adventures
I never would have known
if I proceeded as the crow flies.
Super highways are so sure
of where they are going:
they arrive too soon.

A straight line isn't always
the shortest distance
between two people.
Sometimes I act as though
I'm heading somewhere else
while, imperceptibly,
I narrow the gap between you and me.
I'm not sure I'll ever
know the right way, but I don't mind
getting lost now and then.
Maps don't know everything.

Pablo Neruda: A legszomorúbb vers

A legszomorúbb verset tudnám ma éjjel írni.

Például, teszem azt, hogy "Oly csillagos az éjjel,
fönt kéken dideregnek a messzi csillagok. "

Keringve énekel az éji szél az égen.

A legszomorúbb verset tudnám ma éjjel írni.
Szerettem őt, és olykor tán ő is szeretett.

Hány ilyen éjszakán át tartottam karjaim közt.
Csókjainkkal bejártuk a végtelen eget.

Ő szeretett, és olykor talán én is szerettem.
Hogyne imádtam volna a vad, nagy szemeket.

A legszomorúbb verset tudnám ma éjjel írni.
Érezve: nem enyém már. Tudva, hogy elveszett.

Hallgatva a nagy éjt, mely nélküle még nagyobb lett.
A vers megeszi lelkem, mint harmat a füvet.

Mit számít, hogy szerelmem nem tudta megőrizni.
Oly csillagos az éjjel, s ő nincs itt - hol lehet?

Ez minden. Arra messze dalol valaki. Messze.
Lelkem nem hiszi el, hogy örökre elveszett.

Mintha csak meglelhetném, szemem kutatja egyre.
Szívem kutatja egyre, s ő nincs itt - hol lehet?

Az éj is az a régi, a holdsütötte fák is.
Csak mi, mi nem vagyunk már azok a régiek.

Persze, nem szeretem már, de akkor! hogy szerettem.
Hogy meghallhassa hangom, fürkésztem a szelet.

Másoké. Másoké lesz. Mint csókjaim előtt volt.
Hangja, tündéri teste. A végtelen szemek.

Persze, nem szeretem már, de hátha szeretem még.
Rövid a szerelem, s oly hosszú, míg feleded.

Mert annyi éjszakán át tartottam karjaim közt
lelkem nem hiszi el, hogy örökre elveszett.

Habár ez az utolsó bánat, mit érte érzek,
és most intézem hozzá utolsó versemet.

(Somlyó György fordítása)

Petri György: Ne mondd, hogy nem

Hogy hiányzol: nyilvánvalóan helytelen.
Valamiként az is, ha én neked.
Törölni kellene pár szubrutint.
Kikap-bekap. Az üresjáratok
helyébe: nyelvtanulás, kocogás,
elmaradt tanulmányok bepótlása:
pl. "A filmművészet kezdetei",
"Az algebra és a keres-
kedelmi arithmetika összefü-
ggése. Számrendszerek". Baromi érdekes.
Nem? Hát akkor mi? Folyton úgyse lehet.
Egy férfi résziről. Ebben a korban.
Meg nem is kell mindig.
Ámbár. Olyan szép vagy.
És nekem viszonylag
kevés időm van hátra
(ehhez viszont: nem lehet viszonyulni).
Tehát? Tehát semmi. Vársz vagy várlak.
Különben az újságok is
elég érdekesek, meg a megélénkült
reménytelenség, ami ahhoz képest,
mikor csak pangtunk, pangtunk,
mégiscsak, ugye?
Ugye? Ugye?
Azért most mégiscsak jobb?

Stephen Levine: If prayer would do it

If prayer would do it
I'd pray.

If reading esteemed thinkers would do it
I'd be halfway through the Patriarchs.

If discourse would do it
I'd be sitting with His Holiness
every moment he was free.

If contemplation would do it
I'd have translated the Periodic Table
to hermit poems, converting
matter to spirit.

If even fighting would do it
I'd already be a blackbelt.

If anything other than love could do it
I've done it already
and left the hardest for last.

Mary Oliver: Watching a Documentary about Polar Bears Trying to Survive on the Melting Ice Floes

That God had a plan, I do not doubt.
But what if His plan was, that we would do better?

Mario Benedetti: Lo que necesito de ti

No sabes como necesito tu voz;
necesito tus miradas
aquellas palabras que siempre me llenaban,
necesito tu paz interior;
necesito la luz de tus labios
!!! Ya no puedo... seguir así !!!
...Ya... No puedo
mi mente no quiere pensar
no puede pensar nada más que en ti.
Necesito la flor de tus manos
aquella paciencia de todos tus actos
con aquella justicia que me inspiras
para lo que siempre fue mi espina
mi fuente de vida se ha secado
con la fuerza del olvido...
me estoy quemando;
aquello que necesito ya lo he encontrado
pero aun !!!Te sigo extrañando!!!

Vera Pavlova: 4

Fell in love in sleep,

woke up in tears:

never have loved anyone so much,

never has anyone loved me so.

Had no time for even a kiss,

nor to ask his name.

Now i pass

sleepless nights

dreaming of him.

Sandra Cisneros: You called me corazón

That was enough
for me to forgive you.
To spirit a tiger
from its cell.

Called me corazón
in that instant before
I let go the phone
back to its cradle.

Your voice small.
Heat of your eyes,
how I would've placed
my mouth on each.

Said corazón
and the word blazed
like a branch of jacaranda.

Fodor Ákos: Túlcsorduló haiku a szépségről

Van, ki gyönyörű.
Van, kin észre kell venni.
S van, aki attól szép,
hogy hasonlít egy csúfra,
akit szeretek. 

Lola Haskins: Love

She tries it on, like a dress.
She decides it doesn't fit,
and starts to take it off.
Her skin comes, too.

Louise Glück: The Untrustworthy Speaker

Don't listen to me; my heart's been broken.
I don't see anything objectively.

I know myself; I've learned to hear like a psychiatrist.
When I speak passionately,
That's when I'm least to be trusted.

It's very sad, really: all my life I've been praised
For my intelligence, my powers of language, of insight-
In the end they're wasted-

I never see myself.
Standing on the front steps. Holding my sisters hand.
That's why I can't account
For the bruises on her arm where the sleeve ends . . .

In my own mind, I'm invisible: that's why I'm dangerous.
People like me, who seem selfless.
We're the cripples, the liars:
We're the ones who should be factored out
In the interest of truth.

When I'm quiet, that's when the truth emerges.
A clear sky, the clouds like white fibers.
Underneath, a little gray house. The azaleas
Red and bright pink.

If you want the truth, you have to close yourself
To the older sister, block her out:
When a living thing is hurt like that
In its deepest workings,
All function is altered.

That's why I'm not to be trusted.
Because a wound to the heart
Is also a wound to the mind.

Gioconda Belli: Uno no Escoge

Uno no escoge el país donde nace;
pero ama el país donde ha nacido.

Uno no escoge el tiempo para venir al mundo;
pero debe dejar huella de su tiempo.

Nadie puede evadir su responsabilidad.

Nadie puede taparse los ojos, los oidos,
enmudecer y cortarse las manos.

Todos tenemos un deber de amor que cumplir,
una historia que nacer
una meta que alcanzar.

No escogimos el momento para venir al mundo:
Ahora podemos hacer el mundo
en que nacerá y crecerá
la semilla que trajimos con nosotros.

Izumi Shikibu: Even if I now saw you

Even if I now saw you
Only once,
I would long for you
Through worlds,
Worlds.

Robert Creeley: For Friendship

For friendship
make a chain that holds,
to be bound to
others, two by two,

a walk, a garland,
handed by hands
that cannot move
unless they hold.

Nicole Blackman: It Is In the Leaving

it is in the leaving that the agony begins
—— hope and skin stretched too far

time enough for words
borrowed and weighty

eyes that glisten in the knowing of what comes
always comes
after

airports
train stations
bus stops
take us apart

but we keep knitting together
strangely inevitably
even we don't question it anymore

it is not in the reuniting that we are together

no kind of kiss binds us
each greeting
each meeting
is new is full of searching
of notsureifitwillbethesame

it is not in the continuing

not in the birthdays anniversaries new years
(although they're very grand)
nor in the letters calls poems

the miss you's are careless because they are common

it is not in the waiting

the day-counting
the trip-planning
the bag-packing
no kind of agony that shreds days makes us together
(calendars are cruel)

it is in the leaving

in the last look
last touch
last kiss
one more
will I ever see you again
rip
that makes me sure
that makes him sure
that this is a great love

it is in the leaving

Elizabeth Hobbs: Slow Dancing on the Highway: The Trip North

You follow close behind me,
for a thousand miles responsive to my movements.
I signal, you signal back. We will meet at the next exit.

You blow kisses, which I return.
You mouth "I love you," a message for my rearview mirror.

We do a slow tango as we change lanes in tandem,
gracefully, as though music were guiding us.
It is tighter than bodies locked in heat,

this caring, this ardent watching.

Anna Kamieńska: In a Hospital

By the side of an old woman
who is dying in a corridor
no one stands

Staring at the ceiling
for so many days already
she writes in the air with her finger

There are no tears no laments
no wringing of hands

not enough angels on duty

Some deaths are polite and quiet
as if somebody gave up his place
in a crowded tram

Mario Benedetti: Las Palabras

No me gaste las palabras
no cambie el significado
mire que lo que yo quiero
lo tengo bastante claro

si usted habla de progreso
nada más que por hablar
mire que todos sabemos
que adelante no es atrás

si está contra la violencia
pero nos apunta bien
si la violencia va y vuelve
no se me queje después

si usted pide garantías
sólo para su corral
mire que el pueblo conoce
lo que hay que garantizar

no me gaste las palabras
no cambie el significado
mire que lo que yo quiero
lo tengo bastante claro

si habla de paz pero tiene
costumbre de torturar
mire que hay para ese vicio
una cura radical

si escribe reforma agraria
pero sólo en el papel
mire que si el pueblo avanza
la tierra viene con él

si está entregando el país
y habla de soberanía
quién va a dudar que usted es
soberana porquería

no me gaste las palabras
no cambie el significado
mire que lo que yo quiero
lo tengo bastante claro

no me ensucie las palabras
no les quite su sabor
y límpiese bien la boca
si dice revolución.

Alicia Partnoy: Comunicación

Yo te hablo de poesía y vos me preguntás
a qué hora comemos.
Lo peor es que
yo también tengo hambre.

Alicia Partnoy: Communication

I am talking to you about poetry
and you say
when do we eat.
The worst of it is
I'm hungry too.

Elizabeth Bishop: Conversation

The tumult in the heart
keeps asking questions.
And then it stops and undertakes to answer
in the same tone of voice.
No one could tell the difference.

Uninnocent, these conversations start,
and then engage the senses,
only half-meaning to.
And then there is no choice,

and then there is no sense;

until a name
and all its connotation are the same.

Dorianne Laux: Dust

Someone spoke to me last night
told me the truth. Just a few words,but I recognized it.
I knew I should make myself get up,
write it down, but it was late,
and I was exhausted from working
all day in the garden, moving rocks.
Now, I remember only the flavor --
not like food, sweet or sharp.

More like fine powder, like dust.

And I wasn't elated or frightened,
but simple rapt, aware.
That's how it is sometimes --
God comes to your window,
all bright and black wings,
and you're just too tired to open it. 

Pat Mora: In the Blood

The brown-eyed child
and the white-haired grandfather
dance in the silent afternoon.
They snap their finger
to a rhythm only those
who love can hear.

Pat Mora: En la Sangre

La niña con ojos cafés
y el abuelito con pelo blanco
bailan en la tarde silenciosa.
Castañetean los dedos
a un ritmo oido solamente
por los que aman.

Gustavo Adolfo Bécquer: Rima XLIX

Alguna vez la encuentro por el mundo,
y pasa junto a mí;
y pasa sonriéndose, y yo digo:
?¿Cómo puede reír?

Luego asoma a mi labio otra sonrisa,
máscara del dolor,
y entonces pienso: ?Acaso ella se ríe,
como me río yo.

Anna Akhmatova

Yes, I had loved them, those meetings of the nights -
Upon small table a glass filled with ice,
Above black coffee thick and smelly steam,
From the red heater heavy winter heat,
The stinging mirth of literary parable
And first look of the friend, helpless and terrible.

Marge Piercy: For the young who want to

Talent is what they say
you have after the novel
is published and favorably
reviewed. Beforehand what
you have is a tedious
delusion, a hobby like knitting.

Work is what you have done
after the play is produced
and the audience claps.

Before that friends keep asking
when you are planning to go
out and get a job.

Genius is what they know you
had after the third volume
of remarkable poems. Earlier
they accuse you of withdrawing,
ask why you don’t have a baby,
call you a bum.

The reason people want M.F.A.’s,
take workshops with fancy names
when all you can really
learn is a few techniques,
typing instructions and some-
body else’s mannerisms

is that every artist lacks
a license to hang on the wall
like your optician, your vet
proving you may be a clumsy sadist
whose fillings fall into the stew
but you’re certified a dentist.

The real writer is one
who really writes. Talent
is an invention like phlogiston
after the fact of fire.
Work is its own cure. You have to
like it better than being loved.