Thoughts in Bonsai: Forty-Two

1. How long it takes for you to come!
In all this time
how many times I've gone away,
how many times I've returned!
Yet I cannot stop this waiting!

2. I only want to see, just once,
who can bear you so much!
Who can keep you even better than this!

3. Whatever you've done for me, whenever—
why don't you forget any of it?
I remember nothing at all!
Then will I keep receiving this death sentence
again and again for the sin of doing without doing!?

4. I am on my deathbed... if you can, come once beside my bed.
No, no, I'm not asking you to come see me!
Before leaving, I so want to see you...

5. Don't ask to know anything from me.
What I want to say,
read it in these two eyes.
What has happened,
see it in this heart.
If you cannot understand the eyes, cannot see the heart,
then what use is knowing!

6. Don't look at me like that—
hope is born in vain in this heart!
Why do you keep in those two eyes what you don't keep in your heart!?

7. How much I'm burning—
why do you want to know this every day?
I've already fallen in love completely,
why do you increase the tenderness by saying such things?

8. Tell me truthfully,
whom do you really hate?
Me? Or my love?
Or the failure of not being able to love me?

9. The one who fell at your feet and wept—
him you loved!
And the one whose tears have dried from weeping,
you don't even turn to look at him!

10. Roses bloom in the garden every day!
If you don't touch them, do the poor things ever get to smile!?

11. What kind of love is this!
God is displeased, we two are displeased!
There's no joy in the heart, so we cannot laugh!
We love, so we cannot let go!
What kind of love is this!

12. Suddenly after the power went out,
you held me close in fear!

For two days the rain didn't stop,
for two days the power didn't come.

For two days everything had stopped,
for two days everything had come.

13. Every time the moon rises
you sit beside me and weep—
that's why I'm still alive today!

14. You make the mistake,
and I'm the one who has to ask forgiveness!
You steal,
and I'm the one who has to play the thief!

15. These stones in my chest—
don't remove them, let them stay!
If you remove them it's all over,
how will I see you anymore
so eager in love!

16. They're saying the night is over, light has broken!
Tell them: the one I love
still doesn't love me today!

17. Those wine cups aren't black, you know—
they hold all the nights of a thousand years trapped inside!

18. Water has gathered in these two eyes.
If you return it, floods will flow!
If you accept it, you'll see rainbows!

19. I keep my eyes closed in fear;
when I open them, only tears come!

20. I count nights by weeping,
you count laughter by days.
With what conscience did you come to teach me sorrow?