"rubaiyat" poems
Brother Iran
by Michael R. Burch
Brother Iran, I feel your pain.
I feel it as when the Turk fled Spain.
As the Jew fled, too, that constricting span,
I feel your pain, Brother Iran.
Brother Iran, I know you are noble!
I too fear Hiroshima and Chernobyl.
But though my heart shudders, I have a plan,
and I know you are noble, Brother Iran.
Brother Iran, I salute your Poets!
your Mathematicians!, all your great Wits!
O, come join the earth’s great Caravan.
We’ll include your Poets, Brother Iran.
Brother Iran, I love your Verse!
Come take my hand now, let’s rehearse
the Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam.
For I love your Verse, Brother Iran.
Bother Iran, civilization’s Flower!
How high flew your towers in man’s early hours!
Let us build them yet higher, for that’s my plan,
civilization’s first flower, Brother Iran.
Published by MahMag (translated into Farsi by Mahnaz Badihian), Other Voices International, Thanal Online (India), Deviant Art, Portal Vapasin (Farsi). Keywords/Tags: Iran, Iranian, Farsi, Persia, Persian, brotherhood, culture, civilization, poetry, literature, poets, mathematicians, philosophers
Mar 26, 2020
Mar 26, 2020 at 3:06 AM UTC
I saw the colors of dreams. They are green and violet like the sky, I’ve walked in the purple valley of a glass colored day felt the warm ashes of molten snow in a flash of time. Eaten the Rubaiyat in a Princes place among the black trees and witnessed the death of a thousand twins. I realise now the generous light emitted by letters and words, have tasted inspired delirium. Scanned the immobility of time and place, contemplated the harmony of the disunity of inner vision, and questioned the effects of a false reality. Seen male and female linked in a new symbiosis, which has given birth to a new species, which has given birth to us, we who are the beginning the end and the continuum; those without limitation, without dimension. We, who are the rainbow sons of Lilith…………
Apr 6, 2012
Apr 6, 2012 at 2:03 PM UTC
"Once upon a midnight"*, ghostly,
Partied many, dead ones mostly.
Feasting in the graveyard, sprightly,
Black fanged werewolves gorged, engrossedly.
In the bone yard, drab and squalid,
Apparitions (staring stolid
Neath the veiled moon, clouded lightly),
Sought fresh bodies, lean but solid.
Fiendish eyes shone, light and sparkly,
Ghouls and demons danced, so darkly.
Maggots munching mush unsightly,
Black blood streamed like ink, quite starkly.
Fetid flesh oozed, flowing freely,
Through the crypt doors, cold and steely.
Shadows, ashen, pranced contritely,
Ebon serpents slithered eely.
As it happens, all too often,
Zombies dimly closed the coffin –
Ra, the sun god, rising slightly
Hunger pangs were soon to soften.
If you ask, I’ll tell you blankly,
When you’re feeling dark and dankly
Come to where this happens nightly.
They’ll enjoy the feast, quite frankly...
;-)
* Apologies to EAP
Oct 8, 2013
Oct 8, 2013 at 9:17 AM UTC
impatient for your arms again i rise
to sit and watch your secret sleeping eyes
what dream is this that keeps you lingering there
with smiling parted lips and tender sighs
what joy in sleep fills your so captured heart
while i wait here alone, to watch apart
and gaze upon your much loved gentle face
more lovely than a work of perfect art
i wander in the garden late at night
to gather perfumed roses, pink and white,
while I my patient lovers vigil keep
to bring your morning wonder and delight
the dark, the stars, the moon are gone away
across your sleepy pillow sunbeams play
in this new world refreshed, renewed, be mine
awaken to another golden day
Jun 22, 2014
Jun 22, 2014 at 8:40 AM UTC
These are my modern English translations of ancient Greek poems and epigrams by Sophocles, including antinatalist poems and epigrams.
It’s a hundred times better not be born;
but if we cannot avoid the light,
the path of least harm is swiftly to return
to death’s eternal night!
Sophocles (circa 497-406 BC), Oedipus at Colonus, loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch
Not to have been born is best,
and blessed
beyond the ability of words to express.
—Sophocles, loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch
Never to be born may be the biggest boon of all.
—Sophocles, loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch
Oblivion: What a boon, to lie unbound by pain!
—Sophocles, loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch
How happy the soul who speeds back to the Source,
but crowned with peace is the one who never came.
—a Sophoclean antinatalist passage from the Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam, loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch
The happiest life is one empty of thought.
—Sophocles, loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch
Consider no man happy till he lies dead, free of pain at last.
—Sophocles, loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch
What is worse than death? When death is desired but denied.
—Sophocles, loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch
When a man endures nothing but endless miseries, what's the use of hanging on day after day, edging closer and closer toward death? Anyone who warms his heart with the false glow of flickering hope is a wretch! The noble man should live with honor and die with honor. That's all that can be said.
—Sophocles, loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch
Children anchor their mothers to life.
—Sophocles, loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch
How terrible, to see the truth when the truth brings only pain to the seer!
—Sophocles, loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch
Wisdom outweighs all the world's wealth.
—Sophocles, loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch
Fortune never favors the faint-hearted.
—Sophocles, loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch
Wait for evening to appreciate the day's splendor.
—Sophocles, loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch
We need evening to appreciate the day's attractions.
—Sophocles, loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch
Evening helps us appreciate the day's attractions.
—Sophocles, loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch
Since time dawned
only the dead have experienced peace;
life is snow burning in the sun.
—Nandai, loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch
Keywords/Tags: Sophocles, Greek, translation, translations, English, antinatalist, antinatalism, procreation, contraception, contraceptive, birth, born, death, life and death, day, eve, evening, night, fortune, wisdom, wealth, truth, pain, mother, mothers, mother and child, children
#antinatalist #antinatalism #Sophocles
Jun 8, 2023
Jun 8, 2023 at 7:19 AM UTC
Rubaiyat Al Thurab (Verses of the Dust) – 7
BismillahIr Rahman Raheem
Oh E’ilahi’ (Creator most loved one) (Mehboob E ilahi)
You are the creator most loved one (Mehboob E ilahi)
There is a veil in between you and me,
You are the order, and you are the noble saint,
I am not worthy, to see you through the veil,
Maybe little glimpse You and me, from behind the veil,
let me learn the order from you Oh E’ilahi’
The Order about Our Beloved, and His love,
May I am not worthy, for any of these,
But From You, Oh E’ilahi there is an enlightened lamp (Chirag Dehlavi) and Altruistic (Bande Nawaz)
So I came, in your presence with the utmost respect, beneath your feet as your dust, Allow me to learn,
Tonight, is the gathering of loved ones, let me sit beside the veil,
Let me fade in silence, and watch the gathering,
I Ummah Thurab, not worthy for this knowledge, except remain as dust’ beneath the sky and your feet!
Allah Khair….. Khairul Rabul Alameen Yah Arrahmanur Yah Raheem
Ummah Thurab – Badshah Khan.
Feb 4, 2019
Feb 4, 2019 at 4:45 AM UTC
My tale begins in a magnificent place
Where legends are created and given a face
About a little black fish from a far away land
Searching for light in a living space
So mighty the fish to give a hand
To rescue the seas from a darkness unplanned
The rainbow of colors that was once plain to see
replaced with dark shadows floating above sand
The fish named Shazhad was prince of the sea
It was his job to keep bright for all eternity
The living seas by dawn or by night
The absence of light is a mystery
He swam through the dark, such was his plight
Shahzad flied through the water like a bird in flight
Up ahead, something was gleaming in the sand
Finally, the little black fish found his flashlight
Apr 17, 2011
Apr 17, 2011 at 10:37 AM UTC
How long, how long, in infinite pursuit
Of this and that endeavor and dispute?
From the Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam
a recurring theme that life is brief
never let autumn leaves pass in grief
merriment is precious, love and beauty
bears repeating, is here in fleeting moments
they exist for us to appreciate, to live is your duty
it is never clever to be weighed down with woes
ask one who knows, go for rainbows as they rose
Better be merry with the fruitful grape
Than sadden after none, or bitter fruit.
Jul 10, 2018
Jul 10, 2018 at 3:17 AM UTC
LXXI
The Moving Finger writes; and, having writ,
Moves on: nor all your Piety nor Wit
Shall lure it back to cancel half a Line,
Nor all your Tears wash out a Word of it.
LXVI
I sent my Soul through the Invisible,
Some letter of that After-life to spell:
And by and by my Soul return’d to me,
And answer’d “I Myself am Heav’n and Hell:”
<>
But there are very rare occasions when the translation is so good it actually supersedes the original, taking it to a wider audience. If there is an argument for anyone having done that, it is probably Edward FitzGerald with his translation of “The Rubaiyat” of Omar Khayyam.
Aug 27, 2023
Aug 27, 2023 at 6:40 AM UTC
XXXIII.
There was the Door to which I found no Key:
There was the Veil through which I could not see:
Some little talk awhile of Me and Thee
There was - and then no more of Thee and Me.
Apr 30, 2016
Apr 30, 2016 at 11:12 PM UTC
Rubaiyat Al Thurab (Verses of the Dust) – 8
BismillahIr RahmanIr Raheem
The heaven and earth decorated on this noble month. (Rabi’ al-Thani)
Your feet are blessed, for every guardian, and to this world,
Blossoms flourish in your love even in a dry land,
Oh Jilani, all guardians, gathered to welcomes you,
As you are the king’ to entire guardians,
Everyone welcomes you with utmost respect.
As your are Jilani, my Loved and a respectful Friend,
Let me, hold your noble feet in my heart and walk on this earth.
As dust, of your noble feet’ Oh my Jilani!
Allah Khair….. Khairul Rabul Alameen Yah Arrahmanur Yah Raheem
Ummah Thurab – Badshah Khan.
Feb 4, 2019
Feb 4, 2019 at 4:47 AM UTC
Two spirits live, oh, within my breast
So Goethe said, in my chest
A spark of God raging, and Mephistopheles
In the caverns of my consciousness
Jealous of a wholesome rest
And to stop the precedent
The handshake of the worm and the bird
They strive to shake my confidence
They lure me in with decadence
To rob me of my sense
One part of me will blush
The other, cry out ‘yes’
And another laughs at death
And another shakes their head
It was not Goethe who was right
But the Steppenwolf of Herman Hesse
A thousand flowers of the soul
Meek and wild, young in heart and old
And to recognise only two of them
The greatest tragedy of all
Feb 25, 2016
Feb 25, 2016 at 9:01 PM UTC
As Khayyam in rubaiyat quite often used to say:
Here's the wine, so drink it up, let it make us play.
Don't break this fragile jug, which is made of clay,
Time will pass, and you too may return this way.
May 7, 2016
May 7, 2016 at 6:24 PM UTC
Ah! Life! What can it possibly mean, my friend?
Tell me, before I off to Heaven send.
For wondering, tho' it furrows deep my brow,
At least it is some means of time to spend.
So many questions seem no answers for,
No matter how I pound upon the door,
The doorman may be deaf, or perhaps the lack
Of a secret password missed he must deplore.
An 'Open Sesame' to Aladdin's cave,
Would give me all the answers that I crave,
For answers must be there, this much I know,
Or the fabric of the Universe is betrayed.
So many of us stand in similar plight,
Poets and philosophers day and night,
Waiting with an empty cup in hand,
Pleading - "Fill my cup and give my mind respite."
But knowledge is a trick, it seems to me,
For which 'reduction' is an illusory key,
For if reduced from whole what then is left?
For the whole is where resides the mystery.
I think of Heidegger's 'Being and Time',
A mighty, detailed argument, for mine,
Would discard the answer with the argument,
If it were to be reduced to a single line.
So if we are to know by what Life's meant,
Must journey through its joy and discontent,
For what reduction would do for understanding,
Is reduce the meaning of our Life's content.
That which we've done, our battles won and lost,
When weighed upon Life's ledger as a cost,
What matters then our deeds when all is done,
If into the grave with us our deeds are tossed?
Sep 11, 2017
Sep 11, 2017 at 11:04 PM UTC
The cracked and umber, cyan, lichened bark,
its wintry deprivation echoes stark
impoverishment: the denizens live their
neglected, leafless lives, in Highgate Park.
The winter icy earth’s, anaemic fare,
enough for hungry birds and squirrels, there
is insufficient food for bigger beasts,
who huddle, famished, in the frosty air.
A grassland’s faded, green, uncut, now greets
all walkers down its dwindled concrete streets,
replacement for old honeyed flags: new flaws
displacing golden pathways, lined with seats.
The squirrel, hungry in the cold still gnaws
her nuts: she holds the winter food in claws,
and quickly looks for danger, then a pause,
and runs, avoiding snapping canine jaws
Dec 8, 2024
Dec 8, 2024 at 11:02 AM UTC