Kiran Bhat
A character asked: What is the difference between a character and a sentence?
文字问道：文字跟句子有什么差别？
客燃脑说：
句子好像桥，
文字好像绳。
句子好似蛇，
文字好似虫。
句子是故事，
文字是情节。
客燃脑结论说：它们都引领人到真理。问题更多是你偏向哪个 —— 短时间的剧痛还是长时间的微疼。
A character asked: What is the difference between a character and a sentence?
Kiran responds:
A character is like a rope,
A sentence like a bridge.
One is like a snake,
The other, a mere worm.
One is a story,
The other is the plot.
Kiran concludes: Both the character and the sentence leads to truth. The question is more of which you prefer to take – the shorter one of greater toil, or the longer one of greater ease.
The Mandarin version of this poem appeared in Kiran Speaks (White Elephant Press, 2019).
Kiran Bhat is the author of the poetry collections Autobiografia (Letrame Editorial, 2019) and Kiran Speaks (White Elephant Press, 2019), as well as the Kannada-language travelogue Tirugaatha (Chiranthana Media Solutions, 2019) and the novel We of the Forsaken World (Iguana Books, 2019). He has traveled to over 130 countries, lived in 18 different places, and speaks 12 languages. He considers Mumbai his spiritual base, but currently lives in Melbourne.
SUBMIT to What Rough Beast via our SUBMITTABLE site.
If you enjoyed today’s poem and you value What Rough Beast, consider making a donation to Indolent Books, a nonprofit poetry press.