A Beautiful Poem


Paata Shamugia   |   May 15, 2025


"Beautiful is every living being: a horse, a rooster, or even a quail."

Plato, "Hippias Major"

 

Beautiful is a beautiful woman and man

As if just expelled from paradise Huddled in the shadows of trees

Beautiful is morning coffee and carefree lounging

And stretching total nothingness For as long as possible

Beautiful is the merciless wailing Of sad dolphins

It's time to create an application

That will translate dolphins' sorrows for us

That would be beautiful

Beautiful is love When you truly love

Beautiful is love Even when you truly don't love

Beautiful is poem about Tskaltubo

Its author is beautiful

His museum is not beautiful

Beautiful is Anastasia And I am beautiful too

Sometimes beautiful is the dawn

Always beautiful is Tbilisi at night

And not so beautiful during the day

Beautiful is the blind old man at Dadiani corner

Thoughtlessly contemplative And forgetful of everything

Beautiful are Eco's dizzying lists Which, along with Hippias,

defined the form of this poem

Beautiful is form of any kind And especially this kind

Beautiful is the frozen moment (let's reread the classics)

Beautiful is a new laptop Bought on installment

Which isn't entirely new But it’s OK

Beautiful is every memory

Falling into the black hole of forgetting

Beautiful is the displacement

That we bring into daily routine

To test forbidden boundaries

Beautiful is Plato and Plotinus and Galaktion

Beautiful is the invisible connection That unites these three titans

Beautiful is a person snatched from death's hands

Strange wisdom fills their eyes

Though this doesn't last long

Beautiful are footnotes

I read books for their sake

Footnotes should exceed the main text

Thus the first shall be last and the last shall be first

And this will be, if not beautiful, at least strange

Beautiful are obituaries

Especially those written in advance

A grandiose gesture Of paying debt before the inevitable

Beautiful is a second-generation Toyota Prius

Economical and durable

It burns oil but otherwise you can't fault it

Beautiful is Bruce Lee's famous phrase: "Be water, my friend!"

God, it truly is beautiful

A poem should be written about this

And that poem should be beautiful too

Beautiful is the collector from the Dry Bridge

Who gathers matchboxes

Beautiful are all beings

For whom no modest place was found

Not in poetry

Not in novels

Not in theatrical productions

Not even an online obituary will be written about them

When they finally die

Beautiful is every object

For which you don't need words like "Very" and "extremely" and "especially" and "essentially"

Beautiful is a person who takes risks

Because a person who doesn't take risks

Is not yet a person

Beautiful are all excuses

That awkwardly explain being late to work

Beautiful is the bottomless sorrow

Of a prophet exploded on the mine of chance

Beautiful is a disappointed person

Especially if they are young

They have already managed to understand the main thing

And that is beautiful.