Poem - Troubadour's Lament

The Troubadour=s Lament
by
The People=s Singer Hassan
translated from the Turkish by
Victor Ulsoy and Joel Levitt

The summer=s peak, upon the peaks, is winter white,
Surrounded by eternal clouds of veiling light.
Drunk with sun-wine, poured from above,
Or like a moon struck head, adrift in love.

Mountains, you great mountains,
It=s hard to leave one=s love behind.

*****

Through stalwart oaks like wind blown cypress, I wander
Between, but not among, the violets, all in bunches, and I ponder:
No home for me here high above,
No use at all to fall in love.

Mountains, you great mountains,
It=s hard to leave one=s love behind.

*****

A pleasant place, green leaves bend down to flowing waters,
I have drunk from those cool waters,
Intoxicating odors of Mother Earth and all her daughters,
I have smelled their wild perfumes.

Mountains, you great mountains,
It=s hard to leave one=s love behind.

*****

There are homes on these heights
For plighted peregrines and wedded wolves,
But not for me and no relief for human grief.
My tears but bathe my tender cheeks.
Your rushing waters, your adamantine slopes dissolve.

Mountains, you great mountains,
It=s hard to leave one=s love behind.