Puisi

Wajib

Without Freedom
Still (​ by Raymond A.
Foss)

We gathered, took time off, pondered

our freedom, on the anniversary our
Declaration of Independence when we
dissolved the political bonds when we
proclaimed, to the world, what we
hoped for, what we believed in as a
people, set apart, that we hold these
truths to be self-evident, that we are
born equal, each one, that the creator
gave us unalienable rights, life, liberty,
and the pursuit of happiness.

How wondrous are those words,

how much we have achieved
casting off the chains that hold us
back how far we have to go; but
We are free, by most measures

How hard life must be in the

many places on the globe
where people are not yet free
where there are people still in
the grip of slavery, in
bondage, in fear for their lives,
for their children’s lives for
any kind of future for religious
persecution, indiscriminant
death

How blind we are, to the realities

around the world How silent we are
to the evil that stalks this sphere
How much more we could do if we
took our freedoms more seriously
and invested in justice to the four
corners of this troubled planet

July 4, 2007
20:36

Puisi Pilihan
1

In a Country ​(Larry
Levis, 1946 – 1996)

My love and I are inventing a country, which

we can already see taking shape, as if wheels
were passing through yellow mud. But there
is a prob- lem: if we put a river in the country,
it will thaw and begin flooding. If we put the
river on the bor- der, there will be trouble. If
we forget about the river, there will be no way
out. There is already a sky over that country,
waiting for clouds or smoke. Birds have flown
into it, too. Each evening more trees fill with
their eyes, and what they see we can never
erase.

One day it was snowing heavily, and again we

were lying in bed, watching our country: we
could make out the wide river for the first time,
blue and moving. We seemed to be getting
closer; we saw our wheel tracks leading into it
and curving out of sight behind us. It looked
like the land we had left, some smoke in the
distance, but I wasn’t sure. There were birds
calling. The creaking of our wheels. And as we
entered that country, it felt as if someone was
touching our bare shoulders, lightly, for the last
time.

Puisi Pilihan
2

The Road Not

Taken ​by Robert
Frost

Two roads diverged in a yellow wood,

And sorry i could not travel both And
be one traveler, long as far as i could
To where it bent in the undergrowth;

Then i took the other, as just as fair,

And having perhaps the better claim
Because it was grassy and wanted
wear, Trough as for that the passing
there Hard worn them really about
the same,

And both that morning equally lay

In leaves no step had trodden
black. Oh, i kept the first for
another day! Yet knowing how way
leads on to way I doubted if i
should ever come back.

I shall be telling this with a sigh

Somewhere ages and ages
hence; Two roads diverged in a
wood, and, i, I took the one less
traveled by, And that has made all
the difference.

Puisi Pilihan
3

Saffron
Nationalism ​by
Sher Shah Suri

We are bequeathed on the

nation, And the nation
bequeathed to us. Have pride
they said, For it is the only one in
the universe.

Culture! Culture! Cried the

painter, Oldest of the old. A
single stroke, a blazing hue, He
drew as he had drawn before,
With a saffron brush.

The mural stood in all its glory,

Under the warrior’s watch. Till a
bullet pierced his spine, And he
died while yet on his watch.

Again the painter with his saffron brush was

called, To paint over the blood stained wall. As
the warrior looked on, Remembering his fallen
comrade. Humming the age old serenade.

We are bequeathed on the

nation, And the naton
bequeathed to us. Have pride
they said, For it is the only one in
the universe.