Talking to a stone.
2010-08-26 @ 20:46:31
I really like it.It gives me food for thought.
TALKING TO A STONE
wislawa szymborska
translated by m. cygalski
talking to a stone
i knock at the stone's door.
—it's me, open up.
i'd like to come in,
have a look around
take you in like a breath.
—go away—says the stone -
i'm closed.
even broken to pieces,
we shall remain closed.
even when crushed to sand,
we shall let no one in.
i knock at the stone's door.
—it's me, open up.
i come out of curiosity.
life is its only opportunity.
i'd only stroll through your palace
and later visit a leaf and a waterdrop.
but i've got little time for this.
my mortality should touch you.
—i'm stone—says stone -
out of necessity i maintain my gravity.
so go away.
i've no muscles for smiles or laughter.
i knock at the stone's door
—it's me, open up.
i heard there are great empty halls within,
unseen, beautiful to no avail,
mute, without echoes of anyone's steps.
admit that you yourself know little of this.
—great and empty halls—says the stone -
yet without vacancy.
beautiful, perhaps, yet beyond your feeble sense of taste.
you can know about me yet cannot ever know me.
my whole surface turns to you,
yet my whole interior's turned away.
i knock at the stone's door.
—it's me, open up.
i'm not looking for eternal home.
i'm not unhappy nor homeless.
my world is worth returning to.
i'd come in and leave emptyhanded
and to prove that i was truly present,
i'd represent nothing but words
to which no one'd give faith.
—you can't come in—says stone. -
you've got no sense of partaking.
no mind shall substitute that sense.
had your sight been sharpened till allseeing
it would be of no help without the sense of partaking.
you can't come in, all you have is a mere inkling
of that sense, its bud, an imagination.
i knock at the stone's door.
—it's me. open up.
i can't wait two thousand centuries
to get under your roof.
—if you don't believe me—says the stone -
talk to a leaf, it'll say what i say.
talk to a waterdrop, it'll say the same thing.
finally ask a hair from your own head.
i burst with laughter
overwhelming laughter
though i cannot laugh.
i knock at the stone's door
—it's me, open up.
—i've no door—says the stone.
TALKING TO A STONE
wislawa szymborska
translated by m. cygalski
talking to a stone
i knock at the stone's door.
—it's me, open up.
i'd like to come in,
have a look around
take you in like a breath.
—go away—says the stone -
i'm closed.
even broken to pieces,
we shall remain closed.
even when crushed to sand,
we shall let no one in.
i knock at the stone's door.
—it's me, open up.
i come out of curiosity.
life is its only opportunity.
i'd only stroll through your palace
and later visit a leaf and a waterdrop.
but i've got little time for this.
my mortality should touch you.
—i'm stone—says stone -
out of necessity i maintain my gravity.
so go away.
i've no muscles for smiles or laughter.
i knock at the stone's door
—it's me, open up.
i heard there are great empty halls within,
unseen, beautiful to no avail,
mute, without echoes of anyone's steps.
admit that you yourself know little of this.
—great and empty halls—says the stone -
yet without vacancy.
beautiful, perhaps, yet beyond your feeble sense of taste.
you can know about me yet cannot ever know me.
my whole surface turns to you,
yet my whole interior's turned away.
i knock at the stone's door.
—it's me, open up.
i'm not looking for eternal home.
i'm not unhappy nor homeless.
my world is worth returning to.
i'd come in and leave emptyhanded
and to prove that i was truly present,
i'd represent nothing but words
to which no one'd give faith.
—you can't come in—says stone. -
you've got no sense of partaking.
no mind shall substitute that sense.
had your sight been sharpened till allseeing
it would be of no help without the sense of partaking.
you can't come in, all you have is a mere inkling
of that sense, its bud, an imagination.
i knock at the stone's door.
—it's me. open up.
i can't wait two thousand centuries
to get under your roof.
—if you don't believe me—says the stone -
talk to a leaf, it'll say what i say.
talk to a waterdrop, it'll say the same thing.
finally ask a hair from your own head.
i burst with laughter
overwhelming laughter
though i cannot laugh.
i knock at the stone's door
—it's me, open up.
—i've no door—says the stone.