Sometimes, I, too, tell the ah's <br />of my heart one by one <br />like the blood-red beads <br />of a ruby rosary strung <br /> on strands of golden hair! <br /> <br />But my <br />poetry's muse <br />takes to the air <br />on wings made of steel <br />like the I-beams <br /> of my suspension bridges! <br /> <br />I don't pretend <br /> the nightingale's lament <br />to the rose isn't easy on the ears... <br />But the language <br /> that really speaks to me <br />are Beethoven sonatas played <br />on copper, iron, wood, bone, and catgut... <br /> <br />You can "have" <br />galloping off <br />in a cloud of dust! <br />Me, I wouldn't trade <br />for the purest-bred <br /> Arabian steed <br />the sixth mph <br /> of my iron horse <br /> running on iron tracks! <br /> <br />Sometimes my eye is caught like a big dumb fly <br />by the masterly spider webs in the corners of my room. <br />But I really look up <br />to the seventy-seven-story, reinforced-concrete mountains <br /> my blue-shirted builders create! <br /> <br />Were I to meet <br />the male beauty <br />"young Adonis, god of Byblos," <br />on a bridge, I'd probably never notice; <br />but I can't help staring into my philosopher's glassy eyes <br />or my fireman's square face <br /> red as a sweating sun! <br /> <br />Though I can smoke <br />third-class cigarettes filled <br />on my electric workbenches, <br />I can't roll tobacco - even the finest- <br />in paper by hand and smoke it! <br />I didn't -- <br /> "wouldn't" -- trade <br />my wife dressed in her leather cap and jacket <br />for Eve's nakedness! <br />Maybe I don't have a "poetic soul"? <br />What can I do <br /> when I love my own children <br /> more <br /> than mother Nature's! <br /> <br /> <br />Trans. by Randy Blasing and Mutlu Konuk (1993) <br /><br />Nazim Hikmet<br /><br />http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/regarding-art/
