Diantara “Kerendahan Hati” Taufik Ismail & “Be The Best Of Whatever You Are” Douglas Malloch

“Kalau engkau tak mampu menjadi beringin
Yang tegak di puncak bukit
Jadilah belukar, tetapi belukar yang baik,
Yang tumbuh di tepi danau

Kalau kamu tak sanggup menjadi belukar,
Jadilah saja rumput, tetapi rumput yang
Memperkuat tanggul pinggiran jalan

Kalau engkau tak mampu menjadi jalan raya
Jadilah saja jalan kecil,
Tetapi jalan setapak yang
Membawa orang ke mata air

Tidaklah semua menjadi kapten
Tentu harus ada awak kapalnya….
Bukan besar kecilnya tugas yang menjadikan tinggi
Rendahnya nilai dirimu
Jadilah saja dirimu….
Sebaik-baiknya dari dirimu sendiri”

Friday, 24 February 2006

Oleh : Taufik Ismail
Dilahirkan di Bukittinggi dan dibesarkan di Pekalongan,  ia tumbuh dalam keluarga guru dan wartawan yang suka membaca. Ia telah bercita-cita menjadi sastrawan sejak masih SMA. Dengan pilihan sendiri, ia menjadi dokter hewan dan ahli peternakan karena ingin memiliki bisnis peternakan guna menafkahi cita-cita kesusastraannya.  Ia tamat FKHP-UI Bogor pada 1963 tapi gagal punya usaha ternak yang dulu direncanakannya di sebuah pulau di Selat Malaka.

Penghargaan
Mendapat Anugerah Seni dari Pemerintah (1970), Cultural Visit Award Pemerintah Australia (1977), South East Asia Write Award dari Kerajaan Thailand (1994), Penulisan Karya Sastra dari Pusat Bahasa (1994). Dua kali ia menjadi penyair tamu di Universitas Iowa, Amerika Serikat (1971-1972 dan 1991-1992), lalu pengarang tamu di Dewan Bahasa dan Pustaka, Kuala Lumpur (1993).

“If you can’t be a pine on the top of the hill,
Be a scrub in the valley — but be
The best little scrub by the side of the rill;
Be a bush if you can’t be a tree.

If you can’t be a bush be a bit of the grass,
And some highway happier make;
If you can’t be a muskie then just be a bass —
But the liveliest bass in the lake!

We can’t all be captains, we’ve got to be crew,
There’s something for all of us here,
There’s big work to do, and there’s lesser to do,
And the task you must do is the near.

If you can’t be a highway then just be a trail,
If you can’t be the sun be a star;
It isn’t by size that you win or you fail —
Be the best of whatever you are!” 

By Douglas Malloch (1877 – 1938) : Malloch was an American poet, short story writer, and associate editor of American Lumberman magazine. He was very popular on the lecture circuit doing public readings of his stories and poems. Malloch’s name became a familiar one at the dawn of the 20th century to many thousands of men who ranged the forests and felled the trees. As reviewers wrote, “Malloch’s philosophy is the philosophy of contentment.” “He sings of the open, of hard work, of exposure, of rough living and rough loving. It is verse which belongs to the strong-armed school; a healthy antidote to the softening tendencies which creep in with an age that loves luxury too well.”

He is noted for writing The Round River Drive, which was only the second appearance in print of Paul Bunyan. Besides poetry of the woods, he was commissioned to write a Michigan State Song. His second wife, Helen Miller Malloch, was a newswoman who gained fame in her own right as founder of the National Association of Presswomen.

Source : Poetry by Douglas Malloch – Masonic Poets Society