About the Sun
That sun above your head is
the gas balloon that escaped your fingers
when you were small, the light bulb
above the table where you answer letters
regularly received from a certain Address,
an alarm clock ringing
when you make love, the picture of the moon
the child points at and says:
"it's the sun, it's the sun!" -
The sun? Yes, it's up there
so that forever you will drag behind
your shadows.
Poem in Three Parts
I
Is it cold this night
that I return to you
in its entirety? Colors suddenly disappear
into White. A sigh remains.
II
Behind the whispers of the bamboo grove, in tatters I await
or so you say; aha! your enticement to kill myself is a sham
this time too
III
the shimmering stars have made me drunk,
with constant mention of your name
the bitter wind has made me drunk,
with constant mention of your name
the smell of the wild grass has made me drunk,
with constant mention of your name
I have wanted to kill you for some time now
to become everlasting in you
That Day
We were still waiting when the wind carried in the murmur of
the waves;
we imagined open coral blossoms welcoming the tips of the waves
whose spray obscured the horizon.
"He's still not here," you said; and the sound resounded off
the wall to fade in the cold.
When we heard footsteps outside we were still hopeful; we
imagined that the harbinger had succeeded in crossing the ocean
and would soon announce our release.
But time always passes so quickly before the first word
echoes, who knows what can diminish the cold that has almost
crystallized in our veins.
Quatrain
through the night the sighs of your chest climbed the wall and
fell one by one to the floor
in the morning you awoke to catch a whiff of a smell that
reminded you of something no longer your own
you opened the window:
the sunlight jumped in and you could see indistinct shapes
rising, one by one from off the floor, and transforming
into a kind of gas though still you could hear the sound
of sighs climbing the shafts of light
Poem, 1
So it was we talked the night long: warming ourself on
syllables that rubbing together would burst into flames.
"Say something, the rain that confines us will put us to
sleep and blanket us with a long white cloth and lock the
door to this room!"
And yes, so we did speak the whole night long: "But each word
so quickly became ashes and scattered by the wind made the
air all the more stifling and..."
Poem, 2
I folded the lakes and rivers and tucked them back into my vein.. The forest lay bare. Thus it was the herds of deer would no longer live in my poems for their words were now tipped with arrows dispatched by Rama.
Thus it was the birds could no longer nest between my sentences for they were now so tight there was no space to spare. Only a few hunters remained separated from their dogs following tracks of blood, turning over and shoving around each letter of my words, looking for the fallen animal who had taken an arrow in its vein.
-- Sapardi Djoko Damono
Translated by John H. McGlynn
(Taken from Suddenly the Night by courtesy of the Lontar Foundation)