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Celebrate Spring Today

Rejoice, my love, rejoice,
Its spring here, rejoice.
Bring out your lotions and toiletries,
And decorate your long hair.
Oh, you're still enjoying your sleep, wake-up.
Even your destiny has woken up,
Its spring here, rejoice.
You snobbish lady with arrogant looks,
The King Amir is here to see you;
Let your eyes meet his,
Oh my love, rejoice;
Its spring here again.

[Translated from 'Aaj Basant Manaalay']

Cean Dubh Deelish

PUT your head, darling, darling, darling,
   Your darling black head my heart above;
O mouth of honey, with thyme for fragrance,
   Who, with heart in breast, could deny you love?

O many and many a young girl for me is pining,
   Letting her locks of gold to the cold wind free,
For me, the foremost of our gay young fellows;
   But I'd leave a hundred, pure love, for thee!

Then put your head, darling, darling, darling,

Cats

Those who love cats which do not even purr
Or which are thin and tired and very old,
Bend down to them in the street and stroke their fur
And rub their ears, and smooth their breast, and hold
Them carefully, and gaze into their eyes of gold.

For how can they pass what does not ask for love
But draws it out of those who have too much,
Frustrated souls who cannot use it all, who have
Somewhere too tight and sad within them, such
A tenderness it flows through all they touch.

They are the ones who love without reward,

Case Studies I

You thrust into the coffin
where your young wife lay cold
and even more hauntingly beautiful
for the tragic manner of her death
every one of your unpublished poems.

The poet in you, you wanted
the gesture to say, had died with her.
You would not love again.
This is the nineteenth century.

But seven years have passed.
There are men with shovels.

If you do love again, how much
do you love yourself,
her memory,
your enchanting new mistress,
poetry?

Casabianca

Love's the boy stood on the burning deck
trying to recite `The boy stood on
the burning deck.' Love's the son
stood stammering elocution
while the poor ship in flames went down.

Love's the obstinate boy, the ship,
even the swimming sailors, who
would like a schoolroom platform, too,
or an excuse to stay
on deck. And love's the burning boy.

Caprice

Her mouth is all of roses,
Her eyes are violets;
And round her cheek at hide and seek
Love plays among the roses
That dimple on her cheek.

Her heart is all caprices,
Her will is yea and nay;
And with a smile can she beguile
My heart to the caprices
That dance upon her smile.

Her looks are merely sunshine,
Her tears are only rain;
But if she will I follow still
The flitting way of sunshine
Whatever way she will.

And if she will I love her,
And if she put me by,
Despite her will I follow still.

Can life be a blessing

Can life be a blessing,
Or worth the possessing,
Can life be a blessing if love were away?
Ah no! though our love all night keep us waking,
And though he torment us with cares all the day,
Yet he sweetens, he sweetens our pains in the taking,
There's an hour at the last, there's an hour to repay.

In ev'ry possessing,
The ravishing blessing,
In ev'ry possessing the fruit of our pain,
Poor lovers forget long ages of anguish,
Whate'er they have suffer'd and done to obtain;

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