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 Poetry

An outlet for players whose creativity extends beyond the board. Post your original works here!

The posting of song lyrics is not the purpose of this board and as such please refrain from doing so. Exceptions can be made to this rule if you are the copyrighted owner of the lyrics and the lyrics are not found offensive by the majority of the population.
This board is a place to post your original works of poetry and prose and also a place for discussion of poetry and related areas.

We have received word from Fencer that other's poetry can be posted to this board. These are the two conditions:
1) When someone posts a known copyrighted poem, he must add the author's name as well
2) If the author is not known, the poem can be posted without problems


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9. September 2003, 11:18:31
bilirkisi 
Subject: ON LIVING
ON LIVING

I

Living is no laughing matter:
you must live with great seriousness
like a squirrel, for example-
I mean without looking for something beyond and above living,
I mean living must be your whole occupation.
Living is no laughing matter:
you must take it seriously,
so much so and to such a degree
that, for example, your hands tied behind your back,
your back to the wall,
or else in a laboratory
in your white coat and safety glasses,
you can die for people-
even for people whose faces you've never seen,
even though you know living
is the most real, the most beautiful thing.
I mean, you must take living so seriously
that even at seventy, for example, you'll plant olive trees-
and not for your children, either,
but because although you fear death you don't believe it,
because living, I mean, weighs heavier.


II

Let's say you're seriously ill, need surgery -
which is to say we might not get
from the white table.
Even though it's impossible not to feel sad
about going a little too soon,
we'll still laugh at the jokes being told,
we'll look out the window to see it's raining,
or still wait anxiously
for the latest newscast ...
Let's say we're at the front-
for something worth fighting for, say.
There, in the first offensive, on that very day,
we might fall on our face, dead.
We'll know this with a curious anger,
but we'll still worry ourselves to death
about the outcome of the war, which could last years.
Let's say we're in prison
and close to fifty,
and we have eighteen more years, say,
before the iron doors will open.
We'll still live with the outside,
with its people and animals, struggle and wind-
I mean with the outside beyond the walls.
I mean, however and wherever we are,
we must live as if we will never die.


III

This earth will grow cold,
a star among stars
and one of the smallest,
a gilded mote on blue velvet-
I mean this, our great earth.
This earth will grow cold one day,
not like a block of ice
or a dead cloud even
but like an empty walnut it will roll along
in pitch-black space ...
You must grieve for this right now
-you have to feel this sorrow now-
for the world must be loved this much
if you're going to say ``I lived'' ...



Nazim Hikmet February, 1948 Trans. Randy Blasing and Mutlu Konuk - 1993

9. September 2003, 15:40:19
Back Soon 
Subject: Re: ON LIVING
I really enjoyed that, thank you :o)

9. September 2003, 15:58:51
hokuriku 
Subject: Re: ON LIVING
Hello! I´m very pleased and really delighted that you posted this poem. Generally Hikmet is not so well known here...
Thanks a lot...

12. September 2003, 07:36:51
rgbdbg 
Subject: Re: ON LIVING
bilirkisi - excellent poem!

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