A Selected Bouquet of Western Poetry

A selected bouquet of translated Western poetry, rendered into Arabic by Mr. Fouad Sarruf and offered as a gift to the poetic spirit rooted in every Lebanese heart, which sets forth as love, magnanimity, and goodness set forth.

O sea whose depths cannot be fathomed, you whose waves are the years,
O vast deep of Time, whose waters are burning griefs
with which the tears of mankind have mingled till they turned brackish,
O flood that has no shore! In your ebb and your flow
you clasp the bounds of mortality;
you sicken of your prey, yet roar for more of it,
then spew up your wreckage on your glowering shore.
Who is there that dares to venture upon your swell,
O sea whose depths cannot be fathomed?

In my mind are storms that rage for hours on end,
and my thoughts remain — until the storms rain words upon me —
wilted flowers, or birds glum and sullen.
So blow, you storms, and spread your dark shadows,
for if you rain words upon me, my thoughts become
dancing flowers, and merry birds that sing.

If I look in the mirror, my concern is confined to myself;
but if I look into the pool, it is for the wonders it holds.
If I look in the mirror, I see a foolish man;
but I see a wise man whenever I look into the pool.

A company of herbs stood in heaven before Glory.
Glory said to them: What have you done?
And all of them — save one — rushed to recount their good deeds in life.
As for the little herb, she withdrew to a place behind them, the marks of shyness upon her.
Glory turned to her and said: And you, what have you done?
She said: O Lord, the memory is painful indeed.
And if there were any good deeds in my life, I have forgotten them.
Then Glory appeared in all her splendor, and rose from the throne, and said: O best of herbs!

Some say the world will end in fire,
and others say, in ice.
As for me, from what I have known of desire,
I am of the school of those who say fire.
But if it is fated that the world perish twice,
I think I know enough of hatred
to say that ice suffices to destroy the earth

... until next month.