Rabindranath Tagore translations
These are modern English translations of poems by the great Indian poet Rabindranath Tagore (1861-1941), who has been called the "Bard of Bengal" and "the Bengali Shelley." In 1913 Tagore became the first non-European to win the Nobel Prize in Literature. Tagore was also a notable artist, musician and polymath.
The Seashore Gathering
by Rabindranath Tagore
loose translation/interpretation/modernization by Michael R. Burch
Always By My Side
At one time, you walked by my side, trotting faithfully as I held a treat. But now when I look down, you are gone; you are nowhere about my feet. I glance around for your sweet face, with those eager brown eyes awaiting. You’re usually at the door, or sleeping in your bed, and this time I find myself debating—Did you somehow escape? Did I lock the gate?—but then I suddenly remember. Your life had ended, and you ascended, on one warm day in November.
Untitled
homeless yearning dog
my heart leapt
she sleeps beside me
Partner In Caloric Sins
There's some other ways to save calories
Wave off dessert trays, not easy-peasies
Big donuts are in your face?
Your dog just lessened disgrace
'Cuz he just ate your jumbo-size cookies !
Continental Giant Rabbit
Continental rabbit, so huge, so strong
The big dog's tough rep didn't last too long
Pooch entered the garden gate
Boy, did he miscalculate
Fur flew, pooch too, now a legend in song!
Tom's Little Dog
Tom told his dog called Tim to beg,
And up at once he sat,
His two clear amber eyes fixed fast,
His haunches on his mat.Tom poised a lump of sugar on
His nose; then, "Trust!" says he;
Stiff as a guardsman sat his Tim;
Never a hair stirred he.
"Paid for!" says Tom; and in a trice
Up jerked that moist black nose;
A snap of teeth, a crunch, a munch,
And down the sugar goes!
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Trixie
Dogs have a sense beyond our ken -
At least my little Trixie had:
Tail-wagging when I laughed, and when
I sighed, eyes luminously sad.
And if I planned to go away,
She'd know, oh, days and days before:
Aye, dogs I think are sometimes fey,
They seem to sense our fate in store.
Now take the case of old Tome Low;
With flowers each week he'd call on me.
Dear Trixie used to love him so,
With joyous jump upon his knee.
Yet when he wandered in one day,
Her hair grew sudden stark with dread;
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Trial by Jury
DRAMATIS PERSONAE
THE LEARNED JUDGE
THE PLAINTIFF
THE DEFENDANT
COUNSEL FOR THE PLAINTIFF
USHER
FOREMAN OF THE JURY
ASSOCIATE
FIRST BRIDESMAID
SCENE - A Court of Justice, Barristers, Attorney, and Jurymen
discovered.
CHORUS
Hark, the hour of ten is sounding:
Hearts with anxious fears are bounding,
Hall of Justice, crowds surrounding,
Breathing hope and fear--
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Travels With John Hunter
We who travel between worlds
lose our muscle and bone.
I was wheeling a barrow of earth
when agony bayoneted me.
I could not sit, or lie down,
or stand, in Casualty.
Stomach-calming clay caked my lips,
I turned yellow as the moon
and slid inside a CAT-scan wheel
in a hospital where I met no one
so much was my liver now my dire
preoccupation. I was sped down a road.
of treetops and fishing-rod lightpoles
towards the three persons of God
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Toad Dreams
That afternoon the dream of the toads
rang through the elms by Little River
and affected the thoughts of men,
though they were not conscious that
they heard it.--Henry Thoreau
The dream of toads: we rarely
credit what we consider lesser
life with emotions big as ours,
but we are easily distracted,
abstracted. People sit nibbling
before television's flicker watching
ghosts chase balls and each other
while the skunk is out risking grisly
death to cross the highway to mate;
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