poetry friday

Happy as a Dog’s Tail
by Anna Swir
Translated from the Polish by Czeslaw Milosz and Leonard Nathan
from This Same Sky: A Collection of Poems from around the World 
selected by Naomi Shihab Nye

Happy as something unimportant
and free as a thing unimportant.
As something no one prizes
and which does not prize itself.
As something mocked by all
which mocks at their mockery.
As laughter without serious reason.
As a yell able to outyell itself.
Happy as no matter what,
as any no matter what.

Happy
as a dog’s tail.