stray birds

Stray Birds

*

Stray birds of summer come to my window to sing and fly away.
And yellow leaves of autumn, which have no songs, flutter and fall there with a sigh.

*

The mighty desert is burning for the love of a blade of grass who shakes her head and laughs and flies away.

*

If you shed tears when you miss the sun, you also miss the stars.

*

The sands in your way beg for your song and your movement, dancing water. Will you carry the burden of their lameness?

*

Some unseen fingers, like idle breeze, are playing upon my heart
the music of the ripples.

*

Do not seat your love upon a precipice because it is high.

*

I sit at my window this morning where the world like a passer-by stops for a moment, nods to me and goes.

*

These little thoughts are the rustle of leaves; they have their whisper of joy in my mind.

*


I cannot choose the best.
The best chooses me.

*

They throw their shadows before them who carry their lantern on their back.

*

That I exist is a perpetual surprise which is life.

*

His own mornings are new surprises to God.

*

The bird wishes it were a cloud. The cloud wishes it were a
bird.

*

The stars are not afraid to appear like fireflies.


These are random selections from Rabindranath Tagore's Stray Birds, another collection of short, pretty poetry.