For Better or For Worse
In the evening cool
The fish don’t know the water
Butt for what it is.
~ Basho [Englished by Phillip Whidden]
The octopus trap,
Fleeting dreams beneath the moon,
The bland summer moon.
~ Basho [Englished by Phillip Whidden]
“Perhaps to dream” ~Shakespeare
The captured fishes in a water butt
Swim unaware of what it is or means.
They circle, wide their eyes, not knowing what
Is lurking for them, guts in smithereens
And heads lopped off. These witless creatures swim
As wretched in their doom as you or I.
A jar that slyly, slickly captured him
Holds one lone octopus. We see his eye
Connected to intelligence but he
Perhaps dreams on about some clams to eat.
He has no clue that soon repeatedly
A hand will bash him, softening his meat.
We all dream on, dream on, dream on, except
We humans know that death will intercept.
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