A Sunday Poem

This week’s poem is by Ali Karim (Əli Kərim) called Stone (Daş):

Stone

Half-naked,
Primitive man
Cast a stone at his foe,
Shed blood.
But the stone
Didn’t fall to the ground,
It kept flying,
From horizon to horizon.
Don’t say that the stone disappeared.
That stone transformed into an arrow,
And then a sword,
A bullet,
A missile.
It did not stop as we thought.
It transformed into an atom.
Piercing the summit
And wishes
And the ocean,
It sped away…
Nor has that very stone
Stopped even now,
It still shoots through the air, but where?
It becomes neutron,
Electron-
A lot of this, a lot of that.
Transforming into fire.
Death.
Poison.
You, my contemporary,
You, brother of Truth,
Tell me, can’t that stone be stopped,
That the half-naked,
Half-savage,
Primitive man
Cast so long ago?

For the Azeri, read below…

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A Sunday Poem

This week, read a poem by Mammad Araz (Məmməd Araz) called If There Were No War (Müharibə Olmasa):

If There Were No War

If there were no war,
We could construct a bridge between Earth and Mars
Melting weapons in an open-hearth furnace.

If there were no war,
The harvest of a thousand years could grow in one day.
Scientists could bring the moon and stars to Earth.

The eyes of the general also says:
“I would be chairman in a small village
If there were no war!”

If there were no war,
We could avoid untimely deaths
Our hair would gray very late.

If there were no war,
We would face
Neither grief, nor parting.

If there were no war,
The bullet of mankind would be his word,
And the word of mankind would be love.

Below, the Azeri version…

A Sunday Poem (a day late)

My internet provider conspired to delay my blog posting and my first live fantasy football draft of the season last night, so the Sunday poem comes a day late and my fantasy football draft was doomed to Autodraft mediocrity. For our poem this week, from Fikrat Goja (Fikrət Qoca), we enjoy An Ordinary Man (Adi İnsan). Read more works by Fikrat at his Azeri.org page.

An Ordinary Man

I am not a gulp of water to be drunk:
I am not a road to be walked upon without ceasing.
It’s true, I’m just an ordinary man,
I’m not as great as you to become smaller.
It is greatness itself to just be an ordinary man, my brother!
It is a heavy burden to carry this name
For an entire lifetime.
I have my own family,
My own children,
My own bread, my own life,
My own generation,
My own house,
My own name.
I have a good neighbor
And I have a bad one, too.
I have both friends and enemies!
(Whether it is right or wrong)
I have my own self!
I am an ordinary man
Neither great, nor small.
It’s a heavy burden itself just to be an ordinary man.
I have both an open door,
And an open heart for my friends,
I always have bread and salt* on my table.
I am ready to meet death as a real man.
I am ready to struggle and fight for it.
But I can’t meet death grain-by-grain, drop-by-drop.
I can’t greet my enemy with a smile.
I am not a diplomat;
I’m just an ordinary man
I should be given credit if
I can hold onto this name until the end.

For the Azeri translation, read on…