Stand! Beat Your Drum!
Give your all! Be a friend! Now!
Your hearts will be adorned with many hues. Them!
Perhaps only ours to borrow,
our pipes, our blossoms. Oh me oh my!
Rise, my friend, joyful take your blooms to the drum,
your rancor takes wing! Beautify yourself with them,
the flowers stand tall, cocoa flowers of beaten gold,
Now! They fly into the wind. Oh me oh my!
Raise your voice in song, the turquoise quetzal, that male cock,
the macaw’s cry rules, every shaking rattle and beating drum replies.
Oh me oh my! I down cocoa, I am happy,
Now! My heart is pleased, my heart partakes of happiness.
Oh me oh my!
Not a literal translation, but my attempt to invoke the spirit of the original poetry: Nezahualcoyotl Fasting Coyote (1402-1472 ruler of Texcoco)
C. T. Suddeth 
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