If sometimes I say that flowers smile by Fernando Pessoa
My poetry pals introduced me to Fernando Pessoa, who wrote under many pseudonyms, and I snagged a few poems translated by Richard Zenith in A Little Larger Than the Entire Universe: Selected Poems. This one was XXXI in The Keeper of Sheep by Alberto Caeiro.
If sometimes I say that flowers smile
By Fernando Pessoa
If sometimes I say that flowers smile
And if I should say that rivers sing,
It’s not because I think there are smiles in flowers
And songs in the rivers’ flowing…
It’s so I can help misguided men
Feel the truly real existence of flowers and rivers.
Since I write for them to read me, I sometimes stoop
To the stupidity of their senses…
It isn’t right, but I excuse myself,
Because I’ve only taken on this odious role, an interpreter of Nature,
Because there are men who don’t grasp its language,
Which is no language at all.
Current Tea: Honey Bee tea (black tea with sweet honey flavor from honey bee pollen)
