Rembang *)

When the sky pours down on you with rain

Only spots of drizzle that you get

When the sun's rays shine

For you only the heat and just only that

When the sea throws fishes ashore

You only smell their bad odor

And your sweat produces salt only

To make your wounds throb more painfully

Oh, my beloved town of drought

The tamarind trees

that guard your thoroughfares

and the Tanjung flowery trees

that bedeck your squares --

just like your RA Kartini

who has become a statue --

and a tale for old pensioners

(Your half-naked fishermen

your fishpond laborers

your peasants who pray for rain

your men who look for wood

your thieves who roam the forests

your beggars who beg in market squares

do they know your beloved emancipator?

Oh, my drought soul

Those wanderers who are after something

only pass before you, darling

just like the sun, clouds and wind

-- A. Mustofa Bisri

(Translated from Wekwekwek by TIS)

*) A small town in Central Java, where women's emancipator RA Kartini lived at the beginning of this century.

Prophet's prayer

Oh Allah, my only God,

I expect Your forgiveness

more than my own good deeds

Your blessings are more extensive

than my sins

Oh Allah, my only God,

if I do not fit enough to reach your blessing

make it apt enough to come to me

because it covers all

and I'm part of everything

Oh the Most Merciful among the merciful

-- A. Mustofa Bisri

(Translated from Wekwekwek by TIS)

The Sunday Post occasionally prints poems in addition to its regular short stories. Today we present a poem of a Moslem ulema who is also an expert on Islamic law.

-- Editor