Onni mahtuu 

pariin riviin.

Joskus jopa niiden väliin.

Pekka Kytömäki

              ~

Happiness can fit into

a couple of lines.

Sometimes even between them.

Donald Adamson

              ~

Kastua sateessa, kuivua auringossa.

Vaikeinta yksinkertaisin,

ettei pelmahtaisi täyteen tuulta,

mahtailisi väreillä ja kuoseillaan.

Arto Lappi

                ~

To get wet in the rain, dry in the sun.

The most difficult thing, and the simplest,

not parading around or being puffed up,

boasting, shouting, waving colours and flags.

Donald Adamson

                ~

Omenapuiden

kukat avautuvat

kuin sateenvarjot,

niiden kauneudelta

on mahdotonta suojautua.

Arto Lappi

                ~

The apple blossom,

opening up

like umbrellas.

There's no sheltering

from such beauty.

Donald Adamson

                 ~

Tyyneyden väri: myrskyävän meren valkoinen.

Niklas Salmi

                ~

The colour of calm: the white of an ocean growing stormy.

Donald Adamson

                ~

Linnut näkevät 

muovisen perintömme.

Ihme että ne

vielä laulavat meille.

Pekka Kytömäki

                ~

The birds can see

what we've bequeathed -

plastic. It's a wonder they still

sing to us.

Donald Adamson

Some Glad Morning

One day, something very old

happened again. The green

came back to the branches,

settling like leafy birds

on the highest twigs;

the ground broke open

as dark as coffee beans.

The clouds took up their

positions in the deep stadium

of the sky, gloving the

bright orb of the sun

before they pitched it

over the horizon.

It was as good as ever:

the air was filled

with the scent of lilacs

and cherry blossoms

sounded their long

whistle down the track

It was some glad morning.

Joyce Sutphen

Ode to a Chestnut on the Ground

From bristly foliage
you fell
complete, polished wood, gleaming mahogany,
as perfect
as a violin newly
born of the treetops,
that falling
offers its sealed-in gifts,
the hidden sweetness
that grew in secret
amid birds and leaves,
a model of form,
kin to wood and flour,
an oval instrument
that holds within it
intact delight, an edible rose.

In the heights you abandoned
the sea-urchin burr
that parted its spines
in the light of the chestnut tree;
through that slit
you glimpsed the world,
birds
bursting with syllables,
starry
dew
below,
the heads of boys
and girls,
grasses stirring restlessly,
smoke rising, rising.

You made your decision,
chestnut, and leaped to earth,
burnished and ready,
firm and smooth
as the small breasts
of the islands of America.

You fell,
you struck
the ground,
but
nothing happened,
the grass
still stirred, the old
chestnut sighed with the mouths
of a forest of trees,
a red leaf of autumn fell,
resolutely, the hours marched on
across the earth.

Because you are
only
a seed,
chestnut tree, autumn, earth,
water, heights, silence
prepared the germ,
the floury density,
the maternal eyelids
that buried will again
open toward the heights
the simple majesty of foliage,
the dark damp plan
of new roots,
the ancient but new dimensions
of another chestnut tree in the earth. 

Pablo Neruda

Spring Song 

I wandered in the well-known path,

The sky was bright and blue,

The trees were clad in freshest green,

The sunlight streaming through.

The nightingales were singing loud

Their love-songs from the vale,

The purling brooklet, as it flowed

Seemed chanting a sweet tale.

O whence this gladness in the air?

And wherefore do ye sing?

The little birds were answering me:--

"Rejoice, for it is spring!"

Rejoice, for it is spring! I cried;

Rejoice for all the year!

For winter too--there is no death

In Nature--have no fear!

And joying thus for all the year,

More joyful could I sing

Than bird, or brooklet flowing by:

"Rejoice, for it is spring!"

Mary de Morgan

Spring Quiet
Christina Rossetti (from Verses, 1847)

Gone were but the Winter,
Come were but the Spring,
I would go to a covert
Where the birds sing.

Where in the whitethom
Singeth a thrush,
And a robin sings
In the holly-bush.

Full of fresh scents
Are the budding boughs
Arching high over
A cool green house:

Full of sweet scents,
And whispering air
Which sayeth softly:
“We spread no snare;

Here dwell in safety,
Here dwell alone,
With a clear stream
And a mossy stone.

Here the sun shineth
Most shadily;
Here is heard an echo
Of the far sea,
Though far off it be.”

How do birds first learn to sing?

From the whistling wind so fleet,

From the waving of the wheat,

From the rustling of the leaves,

From the raindrop on the eaves,

From the children's laughter sweet,

From the splash when brooklets meet.

Little birds begin their trill

As they gayly float at will

In the gladness of the sky,

When the clouds are white and high;

In the beauty of the day

Speeding on their sunny way,

Light of heart and fleet of wing...

That's how birds first learn to sing.

Mary Mapes Dodge