Truth Like Poetry: 3

One. When letters used to be written,
even then some letters were never written at all.
Now messages are sent,
yet still some messages are never sent at all.

Those who don't want to write or send
such letters or messages
actually keep hidden away
some dreams, some feelings.

Who has ever received
letters more beautiful than dreams,
messages more beautiful than feelings?

This game that plays in the mind—
no one else keeps track of it.
All that is most beautiful
keeps itself hidden from sight.

Be it letters, be it messages,
can any of them ever become
more beautiful than unspoken words?

Two. Now whenever
I keep you at a distance
and see you
from afar,
it feels good,
love-like.

When I used to see you
up close,
I never really saw
what you actually
looked like.

You did well
not to come near.
If you had come close,
love would have fled
leaving desire behind.

When distant rain
comes home,
who gives it shelter?

You are beautiful—
I didn't understand this
before you went away.
What remains
loses its worth.

When you were before my eyes,
if you caused pain, I'd look away.
Had you not gone so far from sight,
would I have wept if you caused no pain?

Three. After seeing you
I don't understand at all
where I've wandered from where.

I only see
that I'm becoming increasingly unknown to myself.
How strange!

Sometimes light as a feather,
sometimes heavy as stone.
I have to carry both.
This is how I stay alive.

All the things I'm managing to do—
that they could even be done,
I never thought before.
Was I always like this
deep inside?

Sometimes I think,
I'm doing fine now!
Sometimes I think,
was I doing fine before too?

After seeing you
I don't know if I'm doing well.
Before seeing you
I don't remember if I was doing poorly.

Four. Days pass in vain.
One, two, another...
they keep going.
Life has no stopping places.

At day's end I think,
apart from the shame of one day's living,
what else did I gain?
Thoughts never stop.

While thinking, another day
enters life.
Then another.
New meaningless life in the belly of old meaningless life.

Days don't change,
regrets don't change.
Age increases, failure increases.
What an excessive life!

Knowing there's no meaning to being alive, yet
staying alive like this and
beating my brain thinking of success or failure—
for such a purposeless lifespan,
this unearned share in the world's beauty...
was I supposed to get more than this?

Five. Touch has a power.
That power's empire extends
to all cities beyond touch as well.

The first caress,
the first kiss,
the first embrace,
the first union
gives a person
a second birth.
One who isn't born has
much left before becoming human.

One who flees
at the slightest touch—
if you do manage to touch them,
sounds spill from your fingers.

Before and after touch
every person is of two kinds.

Touch's power is such
that even the feeling of not being able to touch
gives birth to words.

Some words spill on paper,
some words seep into the heart.

Touch holds infinite capacity for conception.
In that womb
someone is born,
someone else dies.

Six. When you left me alone
you kept with me
time itself.

Seeing my solitude,
wise time hurled me
into darkness.

In that darkness,
walking the path,
I learned
there's no light anywhere in life.
What people recognize,
they think is light.

There's no such thing as light.
When you learn to walk in darkness,
you meet light among people.
By drowning in darkness
I learned to tear through this darkness...

Beloved, thank you
for not leaving me alone when you went away.

Seven. All the things I couldn't say to you
burn so much!

When it's too late
nothing can be said anymore.

Yet see,
if I had wanted to then,
how much
could have been said!

All that I did say
weighs far less
than all I didn't say.

We only wait
to be too late.

This burning of not being able to speak—
is that what we call
distance?

Eight. When a beloved person goes far away,
the kind of emptiness that takes hold—
I'm living with
exactly that kind of emptiness.

Yet the one I let go,
I didn't try to keep
thinking they weren't beloved.

Do people then
become beloved
after going far away?
Or can people only be known
after they've gone away?

The one who didn't come close even while coming,
why do I keep them close
throwing everything else far away?

The bird flies away
leaving attachment behind...

Nine. I wait,
no one comes.
Again
I wait...

There's no promise of coming,
though even so,
I still wish
someone would come!
I'm human too!

Being born human
has many inconveniences.
Even when you can walk alone,
you can't walk alone.

It would be good to have someone beside me—
living with this thought
is called
a lifetime.

Time isn't passing badly though.
One who has nothing to do in life
is dead.

I'm still alive today.
My heart keeps saying,
someone's coming...!

Ten. None of them say anything.

Moonlight,
evening sun,
flower's fragrance,
scars of separation,
love's intoxication,
wind's touch...
say nothing at all.

The one who makes these silent things speak—
everyone's desperate today to block that voice
and reach heaven.

Is this jealousy?
Or victory?

Eleven. Ignoring the closed window,
the grasshopper
entered the room through the door.

Some flying around
in joy;
then
sitting here, sitting there.

It falls in love with that room,
so it can't leave anymore.

Suddenly struck by the fan blade,
that same room becomes its final refuge—
the room it couldn't leave,
or didn't want to.

Watching the grasshopper die,
somehow I see myself in the mirror!

Twelve. I am like that wildflower
that's needed for no worship,
that finds shelter in no vase,
that receives no one's affection,
that has no name, no identity,
yet keeps blooming
at the Creator's whim,
yet keeps swaying
in its own joy.

Thirteen. Lately I'm afraid of being rejected.
I understand that as age has increased,
hurt feelings have increased even more.

Who pushed me away,
who drew me close,
who did nothing at all—
why do these thoughts come even at this age?

One whose life is measured by constant rejection—
what is there to fear so much in any way of living?

Emotion and feeling
that make one cry—
in such a life
winter comes and goes,
spring comes and goes;
yet age remains fixed
at sixteen.

Fourteen. The song I sang
only for you—
when there was no time to hear it then,
why did you come to hear that song
I sang to forget you?

Fifteen. What you've loved
is superficial.
You don't even know yourself
if you've loved at all.

When you feel alone,
when you need someone,
when darkness falls,
then think of me.

Though you claim
very strongly to love me,
I understand
I am merely
your secret life.

Sixteen. The lines of the face
crooked, illegible.

As always
sweat-soaked,
that map.

Line by line
some gains of life,
some weight of death.

Depth in the gaze;
there,
instead of satisfaction,
at day's end
the compulsion to accept.

Carrying burdens and carrying burdens
becoming a burden oneself
to live as a burden.

Such a person's name is
father.

Seventeen. I saw
people change;
day after day
they keep changing.

Various colors and mannerisms come
and possess people's bodies.

I don't ask questions,
only wonder
silently.
When explanation means
departure,
questionlessness becomes
the only answer.

Without letting the person understand,
staying alone with the person—this isn't called
love, nor acting,
but hurt feelings.

Like shallow life,
love survives
only on hurt feelings.

Eighteen. At your call
I left home and came outside.

Coming, I see
the one whose call made me leave home
has fled,
leaving behind
the wrong person.

People perhaps remain human only as long
as other people don't leave home.

I left home,
and immediately I see
what I thought was home
has made me a stranger
before anyone else.

Nineteen. Some people
are never of any
use.

When there's work,
no matter how much you search,
you won't find them.

When they want me,
when I'm useful to them,
when I do their work,
then that wanting
is of no use at all.

Twenty. Come, let's talk one day.

We two
have loved each other,
we two have stayed beside each other,
but
we've never
had a conversation.

Come, let's get acquainted one day.