Anna Ahmatova: Ház a hóban

Bolyongunk egyre, kéz a kézben,
nem tudunk elszakadni még.
Szótlan tűnődsz. Nem szólok én sem.
Sötétedik az esti ég.

Hallgatunk, templomba betérve,
keresztelőt, nászéneket.
És nem nézünk egymás szemébe...
Velünk minden másképp esett.

Aztán a havas temető vonz.
Ülünk. Könnyűl lélegzetünk...
Egy házikót a hóba rajzolsz. -
Abban mindig együtt leszünk.

(Rab Zsuzsa fordítása)

Rita Dove: Dawn Revisited

Imagine you wake up
with a second chance: The blue jay
hawks his pretty wares
and the oak stands still, spreading
glorious shade. If you don't look back,

the future never happens.
How good to rise in sunlight,
in the prodigal smell of biscuits --
eggs and sausage on the grill.
The whole sky is yours

to write on, blown open
to a blank page. Come on,
shake a leg! You'll never know
who's down there, frying those eggs,
if you don't get up and see.

Fleur Adcock: The Video

When Laura was born, Ceri watched.
They all gathered around Mum's bed —
Dad and the midwife and Mum's sister
and Ceri. "Move over a bit," Dad said —
he was trying to focus the camcorder
on Mum's legs and the baby's head.

After she had a little sister,
and Mum had gone back to being thin,
and was twice as busy, Ceri played
the video again and again.
She watched Laura come out, and then,
in reverse, she made her go back in.

Nicanor Parra: The Nobel Prize for Reading

The Nobel Prize for Reading
should be awarded to me
I am the ideal reader,
I read everything I get my hands on:

I read street names
and neon signs
bathroom walls
and new price-lists

the police news,
projections for the Derby

and license plates

for a person like me
the word is something holy

members of the jury
what would I gain by lying
as a reader, I'm relentless

I read everyting - I don't even skip
the classifieds

of course these days I don't read much
I simply don't have the time
But - oh man - what I have read

that's why I'm asking you to give me
the Nobel Prize for Reading
as soon as impossible

(antitranslated by Lis Werner)

Nicanor Parra: El Premio Nobel

El Premio Nóbel de Lectura 
me lo debieran dar a mí 
que soy el lector ideal 
y leo todo lo que pillo:

leo los nombres de las calles 
y los letreros luminosos
y las murallas de los baños 
y las nuevas listas de precios

y las noticias policiales
y los pronósticos del Derby
y las patentes de los autos

para un sujeto como yo 
la palabra es algo sagrado

señores miembros del jurado 
qué ganaría con mentirles 
soy un lector empedernido
me leo todo - no me salto 
ni los avisos económicos

claro que ahora leo poco 
no dispongo de mucho tiempo 
pero caramba que he leído

por eso pido que me den 
el Premio Nóbel de Lectura 
a la brevedad imposible

Alice Walker: Desire

My desire
is always the same; wherever Life
deposits me:
I want to stick my toe
& soon my whole body
into the water.
I want to shake out a fat broom
& sweep dried leaves
bruised blossoms
dead insects
& dust.
I want to grow
something.
It seems impossible that desire
can sometimes transform into devotion;
but this has happened.
And that is how I've survived:
how the hole
I carefully tended
in the garden of my heart
grew a heart
to fill it.  

P. K. Page: This Heavy Craft

The wax has melted
but the dream of flight
persists.
I, Icarus, though grounded
in my flesh
have one bright section in me
where a bird
night after starry night
while I’m asleep
unfolds its phantom wings
and practices.

Eörsi István: A harmonikus élet receptje

Ha bánt valami,
szedj mélyről a tálból,
szedj még egyszer és menj,
légy máshol.

Tisztára törölt
szemüvegedet vedd le.
Megbékélt szemmel nézz
elhülyülő szemekbe.

Elviselhető lesz
az elviselhetetlen,
de nem lehetséges,
ami lehetetlen.

Mi elfogadhatatlan
- mert a szív belefásul -,
azt ne fogadd el, sőt
ne is vedd tudomásul.

Vaclav Havel: It Is I Who Must Begin

It is I who must begin.
Once I begin, once I try –
here and now,
right where I am,
not excusing myself
by saying things
would be easier elsewhere,
without grand speeches and
ostentatious gestures,
but all the more persistently
-- to live in harmony
with the "voice of Being," as I
understand it within myself
-- as soon as I begin that,
I suddenly discover,
to my surprise, that
I am neither the only one,
nor the first,
nor the most important one
to have set out upon that road.
Whether all is really lost
or not depends entirely on
whether or not I am lost.

Ingrid Sjöstrand: Titkos béketárgyalások

Titkos béketárgyalások –
olvastam az újságban.
Szerintem nem helyes, hogy
titkosak a béketárgyalások.

A háború bezzeg sose titkos.
Egy háború, ahol egy puska se dörrent!
Egy háború, ahol senki se halt meg!
Egy háború, amit észre se vett senki,
mert csak a háboristák mentek oda,
és ott csúnyákat gondoltak egymásról
titokban. Titokban hahaha!

Matthew Sweeney: Cacti

After she left he bought another cactus
just like the one she'd bought him
in the airport of Marrakesh. He had to hunt
through London, and then, in Camden,
among hordes of hand-holding kids
who clog the market, he found it,
bought it, and brought it home to hers.
Next week he was back for another,
then another. He was coaxed into trying
different breeds, bright ones flashing red-
like the smile of the shop-girl
he hadn't noticed. He bought a rug, too,
sand-coloured, for the living-room,
and spent a weekend repainting
the walls beige, the celing pale blue.
He had the worn, black suite re-upholstered
in tan, and took to lying on the sofa
in a brown djelleba, with the cacti all around,
and Arab music on. If she should come back,
he thought, she might feel at home.

John Donne: Devotions upon Emergent Occasions

No man is an island entire of itself; every man 
is a piece of the continent, a part of the main; 
if a clod be washed away by the sea, Europe 
is the less, as well as if a promontory were, as 
well as any manner of thy friends or of thine 
own were; any man's death diminishes me, 
because I am involved in mankind. 
And therefore never send to know for whom 
the bell tolls; it tolls for thee. 

Rebecca Elson: Aberration (The Hubble Space Telescope before repair)

The way they tell it
All the stars have wings
The sky so full of wings
There is no sky
And just for a moment
You forget
The error and the crimped
Paths of light
And you see it
The immense migration
And you hear the rush
The beating

Mario Benedetti: Moods

A happy
man
is but one more
in the choir
of happy
people

a sad
one
is sad
like
no
other

(translated by Louise B. Popkin)

Mario Benedetti: Talantes

Un hombre
alegre
es uno más
en el coro
de hombres
alegres

un hombre
triste
no se parece
a ningún otro
hombre
triste

Alice Oswald: Beaufort Poem Scale

As I speak (force 1) smoke rises vertically,
Plumed seeds fall in less than ten seconds
And gossamer, perhaps shaken from the soul's hairbrush
Is seen in the air.

Oh yes (force 2) it's lovely here,
One or two spiders take off
And there are willow seeds in clouds
But I keep feeling (force 3) a scintillation,
As if a southerly light breeze
Was blowing the tips of my thoughts
(force 4) and making my tongue taste strongly of italics

And when I pause it feels different
As if something had entered (force 5) whose hand is lifting my page

(force 6) So I want to tell you how a whole tree sways to the left
But even as I say so (force 7) a persistent howl is blowing my hair horizontal
And even as I speak (force 8) this speaking becomes difficult

And now my voice (force 9) like an umbrella shaken inside out
No longer shelters me from the fact (force 10)
There is suddenly a winged thing in the house,
Is it the wind?

(http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Beaufort_scale)

David Shumate: Learning Italian Slowly

I learn three words each day. It's been seven months now and perhaps I could carry on a conversation with a Sicilian child. If she spoke slowly. In present tense. And only about pencils and dogs and cheese. Sometimes I feel my new Italian self growing inside me. He's a little man who gesticulates as he speaks. He rides his bicycle to the market to buy eggplant, anise, and porcini. Then delivers them to his elderly mother. In the afternoon he plays bocce with the older men. The children mimic the way he whispers to himself. The grimaces he makes with his face. When the moon comes out he slicks back his hair and sings beneath the window of the woman he loves. What a sight he is. Down on one knee. His arms outstretched. So willing to make a fool of himself. Over and over again.

Epstein Ágnes: Ismerős

Láttalak már valahol,

ismerlek.

Te vagy az, aki

velem számolná

a Szahara homokszemeit.

Kiss Judit Ágnes: Szájber-özvegy

Hazajössz, és ledobod magad a computer elé,
Se csók, se puszi, se ölelés, csak egy odavetett helló.
Azután késő estig csak a billentyűzet zörög,
Hallom, ahogyan zárnak az áramkörök.

Bezárkózol valami cédé-rommal,
Én meg kettesben maradok a vibrátorommal,
Már éjfél van, és te csak azt a szart vered,
Hogy száradna le lassan a hardvered.

Egy  hangyányit sem törődtem a józan ésszel,
Pedig többre mehettem volna egy jó zenésszel,
És most a lakásomba költözött egy PC-görény,
Aki havonta egyszer szexel, ilyen szar az arány.
Az ember sose tudhatja, hogy melyiktől van baja:
A tejszínes tea, vagy a kínai kaja?
A dobozos sörök, a csipszek, a neten rendelt pizzák?
Kezek, amik egy virtuális műnő mellét tapizzák.

Már éjjel kettő, de te csak ezt a fost vered,
Hogy aszna össze minden egyes softvered!
Látom, valami az agyadra ment, ez már tuti biztos,
Egy pasi, aki reggel büdös, estére meg piszkos.
Ez rosszabb, mint egy halálos karambol.
Kitépem a dugódat a falamból.
Hapsikám, a cuccaidat holnap estig vidd el,
Töröltelek végleg egy shift delete-tel.

William Stafford: Any Morning

Just lying on the couch and being happy.
Only humming a little, the quiet sound in the head.
Trouble is busy elsewhere at the moment, it has
so much to do in the world.

People who might judge are mostly asleep; they can't
monitor you all the time, and sometimes they forget.
When dawn flows over the hedge you can
get up and act busy.

Little corners like this, pieces of Heaven
left lying around, can be picked up and saved.
People wont even see that you have them,
they are so light and easy to hide.

Later in the day you can act like the others.
You can shake your head. You can frown.

Charles Bukowski: safe

the house next door makes me
sad.
both man and wife rise early and
go to work.
they arrive home in early evening.
they have a young boy and a girl.
by 9 p.m. all the lights in the house
are out.

the next morning both man and
wife rise early again and go to
work.
they return in early evening.
By 9 p.m. all the lights are
out.
the house next door makes me
sad.
the people are nice people, I
like them.

but I feel them drowning.
and I can't save them.

they are surviving.
they are not
homeless.

but the price is
terrible.

sometimes during the day
I will look at the house
and the house will look at
me
and the house will
weep, yes, it does, I
feel it.

Nicanor Parra: An advocate for his own cause

arrives at a grave marked "x"
in the Metropolitan Cemetery
with red carnations in a small bouquet
tips his hat with great solemnity
and in the absence of a vase deposits
his offering in a modest peach can
that he removes from a neighboring grave

(antitranslated by Liz Werner)

Nicanor Parra: Un abogado de su propia causa

llega a una tumba equis
del Cementerio Metropolitano
con un ramito de claveles rojos
Se descubre con gran solemnidad
y a falta de florero deposita su ofrenda
en un modesto tarro duraznero
que sustrae de una tumba vecina

Charles Bukowski: What A Writer

what i liked about e.e. cummings
was that he cut away from
the holiness of the
word
and with charm
and gamble
gave us lines
that sliced through the
dung.

how it was needed!
how we were withering
away
in the old
tired
manner.

of course, then came all
the e.e. cummings
copyists.
they copied him then
as the others had
copied Keats, Shelly,
Swinburne, Byron, et
al.

but there was only
one
e.e. cummings.
of course.

one sun.

one moon.

Lukács Sándor: Elszökött szavak

Elszökött szavak
tértek meg hozzám éjszaka.
Nehéz volt nélkülük élnem.
Hiányuk már-már beteggé tett,
mégsem indultam keresésükre.
Hagytam, hogy kószálják ki maguk,
ütközzenek meg nélkülem,
én ismerkedem addig a némasággal.
De nem némaság volt ez,
inkább a tudat űrében trónoló Semmi.
A kifejezhetetlenség állapota.
S most, hogy ugrásra készen,
agyamban-torkomban rejteznek megint,
vajon kimondhatom-e őket újra?

Adrienne Rich: Song

You’re wondering if I’m lonely:
OK then, yes, I’m lonely
as a plane rides lonely and level
on its radio beam, aiming
across the Rockies
for the blue-strung aisles
of an airfield on the ocean.
You want to ask, am I lonely?
Well, of course, lonely
as a woman driving across country
day after day, leaving behind
mile after mile
little towns she might have stopped
and lived and died in, lonely
If I’m lonely
it must be the loneliness
of waking first, of breathing
dawns’ first cold breath on the city
of being the one awake
in a house wrapped in sleep
If I’m lonely
it’s with the rowboat ice-fast on the shore
in the last red light of the year
that knows what it is, that knows it’s neither
ice nor mud nor winter light
but wood, with a gift for burning

Kim Addonizio: Forms of Love

I love you but I'm married.
I love you but I wish you had more hair.
I love you more.
I love you more like a friend.
I love your friends more than you.
I love how when we go into a mall and classical muzak is playing,
you can always name the composer.
I love you, but one or both of us is/are fictional.
I love you but "I" am an unstable signifier.
I love you saying, "I understand the semiotics of that" when I said, "I
had a little personal business to take care of."
I love you as long as you love me back.
I love you in spite of the restraining order.
I love you from the coma you put me in.
I love you more than I've ever loved anyone, except for this one guy.
I love you when you're not getting drunk and stupid.
I love how you get me.
I love your pain, it's so competitive.
I love how emotionally unavailable you are.
I love you like I'm a strange backyard and you're running from the
cops, looking for a place to stash your gun.
I love your hair.
I love you but I'm just not that into you.
I love you secretly.
I love how you make me feel like I'm a monastery in the desert.
I love how you defined grace as the little turn the blood in the
syringe takes when you're shooting heroin, after you pull back
the plunger slightly to make sure you hit the vein.
I love your mother, she's the opposite of mine.
I love you and feel a powerful spiritual connection to you, even
though we've never met.
I love your tacos! I love your stick deodorant!
I love it when you tie me up with ropes using the knots you
learned in Boy Scouts, and when you do the stoned Dennis
Hopper rap from Apocalypse Now!
I love your extravagant double takes!
I love your mother, even though I'm nearly her age!
I love everything about you except your hair.
If it weren't for that I know I could really, really love you.

Fodor Ákos: Két gyerek-portré

LÁNY

(levél:)

Tudod, őt is nagyon szeretem. Képzeld,
annyira, hogy mindig, ha csak van két almám,
a másikat akármikor nekiadnám.
                                                 De téged,
téged annyira szeretlek, hogy mikor van két almám,
abból neked mindig az egyiket adnám!

FIÚ

(röpdolgozat:)

Azt tanultuk, hogy MINDENT AZÉRT NEM LEHET!!!

- Kár.

Káli László: Tudod Kedves

Tudod Kedves, az éjszaka nem attól szép,
hogy kigyúlnak a fények, és mégis a sötét
telepszik meg halkan a fák sűrű lombjain,
utcák kövén, letűnt hű szerelmek romjain.
Hanem hogy előtte még sugárzó vérvörösbe
öltözik az ég, s a Napot magába ölelve,
mint szerető a kedvesét, a Föld nyugodni tér.
Előtte lángcsókkal elköszön, s milliónyi fehér
csillaglámpást varázsol az égbolt köpenyére.
Tudod Kedves, nem attól lesz szép az élet,
hogy: mi volt. Hanem hogy ami jön, hogyan
éled. Az idő-vonat úgyis gyorsan elrohan.

Jane Kenyon: Otherwise

I got out of bed
on two strong legs.
It might have been
otherwise. I ate
cereal, sweet
milk, ripe, flawless
peach. It might
have been otherwise.
I took the dog uphill
to the birch wood.
All morning I did
the work I love.
At noon I lay down
with my mate. It might
have been otherwise.
We ate dinner together
at a table with silver
candlesticks. It might
have been otherwise.
I slept in a bed
in a room with paintings
on the walls, and
planned another day
just like this day.
But one day, I know,
it will be otherwise.

Raymond Carver: Still Looking Out for Number One

Now that you’ve gone away for five days,
I’ll smoke all the cigarettes I want,
where I want. Make biscuits and eat them
with jam and fat bacon. Loaf. Indulge
myself. Walk on the beach if I feel
like it. And I feel like it, alone and
thinking about when I was young. The people
then who loved me beyond reason.
And how I loved them above all others.
Except one. I’m saying I’ll do everything
I want here while you’re away!
But there’s one thing I won’t do.
I won’t sleep in our bed without you.
No. It doesn’t please me to do so.
I’ll sleep where I damn well feel like it –
where I sleep best when you’re away
and I can’t hold you the way I do.
On the broken sofa in my study.

Mario Benedetti: Heaven

Our torturers are generally catholic
they believe in the holy trinity
and martyr their fellow creatures as a means
of combating the antichrist
but when they die they don't go to heaven
because murderers aren't allowed there

their victims on the other hand are martyrs
and might even be angels or saints
they'd rather be buthcered than be traitors
but they don't go to heaven either
because to them there's no such thing.

(translated by Louise B. Popkin)

Mario Benedetti: El Paraíso

Los verdugos suelen ser católicos
creen en la santísima trinidad
y martirizan al prójimo como un medio
de combatir el anticristo
pero cuando mueren no van al cielo
porque allí no aceptan asesinos

sus víctimas en cambio son mártires
y hasta podrían ser ángeles o santos
prefieren ser deshechos antes que traicionar
pero tampoco van al cielo
porque no creen que el cielo exista.

Yevgeny Yevtushenko: Waiting

My love will come
will fling open her arms and fold me in them,
will understand my fears, observe my changes.
In from the pouring dark, from the pitch night
without stopping to bang the taxi door
she’ll run upstairs through the decaying porch
burning with love and love’s happiness,
she’ll run dripping upstairs, she won’t knock,
will take my head in her hands,
and when she drops her overcoat on a chair,
it will slide to the floor in a blue heap.

Charles Bukowski: writing

often it is the only
thing
between you and
impossibility.
no drink,
no woman's love,
no wealth
can
match it.
nothing can save
you
except
writing.
it keeps the walls
from
failing.
the hordes from
closing in.
it blasts the
darkness.
writing is the
ultimate
psychiatrist,
the kindliest
god of all the
gods.
writing stalks
death.
it knows no
quit.
and writing
laughs
at itself,
at pain.
it is the last
expectation,
the last
explanation.
that's
what it
is.

Weöres Sándor: Üdvösség

Csak azért
az egyetlen napért
érdemes volt megszületnem,
amikor szeretni tudtam,
és szeretnek-e, nem kérdeztem.
Csak ennyi történt teljes életemben,
egyébkor szakadékba buktam.
Csak azért
az egyetlen napért
érdemes volt megszületnem.

Sárhelyi Erika: Gólyahír és gesztenye

Fölénk nő az idő, mint a falomb,
ránk kérgesedik sok hétköznapi gond,
sorsvonalunk masszív, hajlékony ág,
s már nem jajdulunk, ha fejsze éle vág.

Pedig olykor gyökerestül kéne
mindent szakítva, új ösvényre lépve,
menni, futni túl ezer hegytetőn,
menni, míg egy vad folyó szembe jön,

és sodródni a háborgó árral,
összekeveredni iszappal, sárral,
tajtékok között partra csapódva
belesimulni forró lábnyomokba.

De mi csak állunk, törzsünk töretlen,
állunk a szelíd, csöndes rengetegben,
gólyahírre hullik a gesztenye -
s maradunk úgy is, ha menni kellene.

Sárhelyi Erika: A körúttól beljebb

A körúttól beljebb, ócska tereken,
hová az ünnep fénye már nem ér el,
összevackol két reszkető idegen,
s olcsó bor mellé kegyelmet ebédel.

A körúttól beljebb, hol vadabb a tél,
vékony a kabát, s nem melegít a hit,
a képzelet meleg szobákról mesél,
s megkopott, fénytelen diákat vetít.

A körúttól beljebb ajándék a Nap,
ahogy áttör a ködszürke reggelen,
a nyomor álmában kalácsba harap,
majd felriad, hogy holnapra eltegyen.

A körúttól beljebb nincs gyantaillat,
csak olcsó gyertya és konok tövisek,
másnapos mámor, mi vágyakat ringat,
s kitép a létezésből egy keveset.

Szép Ernő: Ne hidd!

Ne hidd, ne hidd, ami igaz,
Ami kegyetlen, ami gaz,
Mi ocsmány és alávaló
Ne hidd, ne hidd, ami való.

Hazugság, amit a lap ír,
Félrebeszél az a papír,
Meredt szemekkel aki sug
Az mind gyalázatos hazug.

Ugratnak, játszanak veled;
Nem lehet az, hogy képzeled!
Nem hiheted, ha van hited,
Gazember vagy, ha elhiszed.

Ne hidd el, ne hidd el, mi gaz,
Ordítsd az égre: nem igaz!
Szeme közé kacagj neki,
Ki a borzasztót hirdeti.

Hátrálj, zárkózz el, menekülj,
Vigyázz, ne süllyedj, el ne züllj,
Vigyázz, a szenny meg ne egyen,
Ne rothadj itt elevenen.

Hallod, ne hidd, mi rút, mi vad,
Mi undort és gyötrelmet ad,
A fényképed, meg a tavasz,
S az Igazság, az az igaz.

Csak ami szép, jó, mindig az,
Mit álmodtál, az az igaz,
Mi nem divat, mi nem haló,
Az, ami örökkévaló.

Csak a kedvesség, az öröm,
A pardon, meg a köszönöm,
A gyöngédség, a figyelem,
Csak az az igaz idelenn.

Csak a segítség, a vigasz,
A barátság, az az igaz.
Csak az a gyémánt-szeretet,
Mi a szívekre veretett.

Beléd döfték a kést: ne hidd,
Kiszaggathatják beleid,
Míg lélegzel s eszmél agyad,
A bűnt tagadd, tagadd, tagadd.

Megmarkolom két válladat,
Szemembe nézz, ne hadd magad,
Tiszta maradj, maradj szabad,
Ne bukj el, meg ne add magad.

Légy tiszta, hős légy, légy erős,
Holtrészeg légy, légy eszelős,
A Földre felhőkből tekints.
Te légy az isten, hogyha nincs.

Tamkó Sirató Károly: Biztató

Ne ess kétségbe, érjen bármi!
Csak egy a törvény: várni. Várni!

Ha reszket alattad a föld:
Csak önmagadat meg ne öld!

Ha egyetlen vagy, mint a szálfa.
Felvirrad még magányod álma.

Minden beérik, révbe fut:
És győz az, ki várni tud.

Wendy Cope: Some More Light Verse

You have to try. You see the shrink.
You learn a lot. You read. You think.
You struggle to improve your looks.
You meet some men. You write some books.
You eat good food. You give up junk.
You do not smoke. You don’t get drunk.
You take up yoga, walk and swim.
And nothing works. The outlook’s grim.
You don’t know what to do. You cry.
You’re running out of things to try.

You blow your nose. You see the shrink.
You walk. You give up food and drink.
You fall in love. You make a plan.
You struggle to improve your man.
And nothing works. The outlooks grim.
You go to yoga, cry and swim.
You eat and drink. You give up looks.
You struggle to improve your books.
You cannot see the point. You sigh.
You do not smoke. You have to try.

William Ernest Henley: Invictus

Out of the night that covers me,
Black as the pit from pole to pole,
I thank whatever gods may be
For my unconquerable soul.
In the fell clutch of circumstance
I have not winced nor cried aloud.
Under the bludgeonings of chance
My head is bloody, but unbowed.
Beyond this place of wrath and tears
Looms but the Horror of the shade,
And yet the menace of the years
Finds and shall find me unafraid.
It matters not how strait the gate,
How charged with punishments the scroll,
I am the master of my fate:
I am the captain of my soul.