Thoughts in Bonsai: Thirty-Eight

1. Perhaps you need to mistreat me.
But I simply have no time to endure your mistreatment!

2. You are like that old beloved coffee mug in my life,
the one I need every morning even though its handle is broken!

3. Come visit my city of Agra;
if you don't wish it, I won't even go to the Taj Mahal,
but do come visit.

4. One who is not satisfied with devotion alone but also needs flowers—
he is not God, he is a deity.

5. How foolish I was!
To think I wanted to drown in love
one whose lips spoke false entreaties of love, whose heart cried out for saris and jewelry!

Today I can keep her happy at such little cost!

6. For God's sake, torment me no more!
You are so pious, and I too am a child of that same God!

7. Stay in life if you will;
but remove yourself from the borders of my sight!

8. If you consider yourself wealthy even while standing in God's house,
how can God consider you human?

9. In which religion is there a God greater than hunger,
a deity greater than food?
Tell me, and only then will I convert!

10. Everyone wants only to be Hindu, to be Muslim, to be Buddhist, to be Christian.
Who wants to be human!?

11. How much I have received in this life!
I got certificates, I got a job, I got a salary, and after service I even got a pension.
What a barren life, spent only in receiving!

12. I see that everyone loves me!
Why wouldn't they? What they love, they find with me!

13. After selling my conscience for just a few coins,
I see that inflation has begun in the country!

14. The people of this city walk with their minds tucked into their hearts!
Stay here a few days, you'll like it!

15. Almost all of humanity's fascination is with bad people.
Good people can't afford to buy masks,
so everyone is annoyed with the poor souls.

16. What is this great interest you all have in my poetry?
What is there here?
Those who have been deceived, and those who have deceived. That's all!
Being the second type of person yet thinking yourself the first—
is that why you read my poetry?

17. Before falling in love with you,
had I spoken a little with your enemies,
so much would not have happened today!

18. Those you wish to see but cannot see—
them you know.
Do you know of those
who wish to see you but cannot?

19. People remember most those
who have wronged them!
That's why you forgot me so easily,
while I cannot forget you!

20. First I divided the land, then the house.
Then I see that in my own home, I alone am the stranger!