The Cat and the Mouse
Obeyd Zakaniعبید زاکانی
اگر داری تو عقل و دانش و هوش
If you have reason, knowledge and wits,
بیا بشنو حدیث گربه و موش
come and hear the tale of the cat and the mouse.
بخوانم از برایت داستانی
I will tell you a story
که در معنای آن حیران بمانی
whose meaning will leave you amazed.
ای خردمند عاقل و دانا
O wise and clever and knowing one,
قصه موش و گربه برخوانا
read the tale of the mouse and the cat.
قصه موش و گربه منظوم
The tale of the mouse and the cat, in verse:
گوش کن همچو در غلتانا
listen to it, like a rolling pearl.
از قضای فلک یکی گربه
By the decree of fate there was a cat
بود چون اژدها به کرمانا
like a dragon, in Kerman.
شکمش طبل و سینه‌اش چو سپر
His belly was a drum, his chest like a shield;
شیر دم و پلنگ چنگانا
he had a lion’s tail and a leopard’s claws.
از غریوش به وقت غریدن
At the sound of his roar, when he roared,
شیر درنده شد هراسانا
the fierce lion took fright.
سر هر سفره چون نهادی پای
Whenever he set foot at the head of a spread,
شیر از وی شدی گریزانا
the lion would run away from him.
A note for readers
The opening of Mush o Gorbeh (The Mouse and the Cat), the most popular comic poem in Persian, long a children’s favourite. After a two-couplet prologue it settles into a single rhyme, every line ending in -ānā, and introduces its villain, a cat ‘like a dragon’ in Kerman. The poem is traditionally given to Obeyd, but many scholars doubt that the popular text is his.
More poemsشعرهای دیگر
مرغی دیدم نشسته بر باره طوس
در پیش نهاده کله کیکاووس
I saw a bird perched on the ramparts of Tus,
with the skull of Kay Kavus set down before it.
A Bird on the Walls of Tus
یکی قطره باران ز ابری چکید
خجل شد چو پهنای دریا بدید
A drop of rain fell from a cloud;
it was ashamed when it saw the breadth of the sea.
A Drop of Rain
ابتدای کار سیمرغ ای عجب
جلوه‌گر بگذشت بر چین نیم‌شب
The beginning of the Simorgh’s story, how wonderful:
in all his splendour he passed over China at midnight.