Meditation on a Bone

A piece of bone, found at Trondhjem in 1901, with the following runic inscription (about A.D. 1050) cut on it: I loved her as a maiden; I will not trouble Erlend’s detestable wife; better she should be a widow.

Words scored upon a bone,

Scratched in despair or rage —

Nine hundred years have gone;

Now, in another age,

They burn with passion on

A scholar’s tranquil page.

The scholar takes his pen

And turns the bone about,

And writes those words again.

Once more they seethe and shout

And through a human brain

Undying hate rings out.

“I loved her when a maid;

I loathe and love the wife

That warms another’s bed:

Let him beware his life!”

The scholar’s hand is stayed;

His pen becomes a knife

To grave in living bone

The fierce archaic cry.

He sits and reads his own

Dull sum of misery.

A thousand years have flown

Before that ink is dry.

And, in a foreign tongue,

A man, who is not he,

Reads and his heart is wrung

This ancient grief to see,

And thinks: When I am dung,

What bone shall speak for me?

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Poems in English 

• Early summer rain by Yosa Buson by Yosa Ёса Buson Бусон 与謝蕪村
• Dawn by Yosa Buson by Yosa Ёса Buson Бусон 与謝蕪村
• Coolness by Yosa Buson by Yosa Ёса Buson Бусон 与謝蕪村
• Calligraphy of geese by Yosa Buson by Yosa Ёса Buson Бусон 与謝蕪村
• Buying leeks by Yosa Buson by Yosa Ёса Buson Бусон 与謝蕪村
• Blown from the west by Yosa Buson by Yosa Ёса Buson Бусон 与謝蕪村
• Blow of an ax by Yosa Buson by Yosa Ёса Buson Бусон 与謝蕪村
• Before the white chrysanthemum by Yosa Buson by Yosa Ёса Buson Бусон 与謝蕪村
• A bat flits by Yosa Buson by Yosa Ёса Buson Бусон 与謝蕪村
• Untitled XXVII by Yunus Emre by Yunus يونس امره Emre Юнус Эмре
• Untitled XXVI by Yunus Emre by Yunus يونس امره Emre Юнус Эмре
• Untitled XXV by Yunus Emre by Yunus يونس امره Emre Юнус Эмре
• Untitled XXIX by Yunus Emre by Yunus يونس امره Emre Юнус Эмре
• Untitled XXIV by Yunus Emre by Yunus يونس امره Emre Юнус Эмре
• Untitled XXIII by Yunus Emre by Yunus يونس امره Emre Юнус Эмре
• Untitled XXII by Yunus Emre by Yunus يونس امره Emre Юнус Эмре
• Untitled XXI by Yunus Emre by Yunus يونس امره Emre Юнус Эмре
• Untitled XX by Yunus Emre by Yunus يونس امره Emre Юнус Эмре
• Untitled XVIII by Yunus Emre by Yunus يونس امره Emre Юнус Эмре
• Untitled XVII by Yunus Emre by Yunus يونس امره Emre Юнус Эмре

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Yahoo– yes, it’s still around, amazingly, miraculously, incredibly, but now it seems to be powered by Bing.

 

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