In Translation

Another month, another installation of Words Without Borders. The July issue features "religious literature," and the first item I clicked on was a translation of Wang Wei by David Hinton, whose version of Lao Tzu's Tao Te Ching was a significant influence on my own work. But there's also a batch of medieval Hebrew poetry and samples of verse by Sohab Sepehri:

How delicious this water is!
How refreshing this stream!
Those people who live upstream,
how fortunate they are!
May their springs be ever fresh,
their cows always fertile!
I haven't seen their village,
But surely, God's foot is on
their threshing floor and
the moonlight there illuminates
the width of their words.
The walls are low in the village upstream.
Blue there is really blue.
When buds blossom, they know, those people.
What a village it must be!
May its streets be filled with music!