At one point, the whole world seemed to scorn Liu Yunfan, including me and my wife.
2
Liu Yunfan, 23 years old, completed vocational school, but then failed as a cook, a motor-scooter jitney, and a street peddler of roasted potatoes, so as a last resort became an unskilled laborer, which we reluctantly accepted, hoping he would survive with honest hard work. He worked on a farm, did concrete molding and landscaping, but in all these jobs he failed because he was too dopey and cranky. Earlier this year I told him to come to my classes. Even though it was unlikely he would be any good at poetry, I believe art can redeem life just like religion. Sure enough, he began to calm down and ponder his place in the world. He then got his qualification as a security guard, ready to be self-reliant. Just about then, I met Liu Hui, a 36-year-old man from Shaoyang, teaching at Laojida. A painter and a fair poet, quiet and gaunt, Teacher Liu defended art like a fierce warrior. Still, sometimes he despaired and looked for a glass of wine in my house.
3
Liu Yunfan, stocky but slow-witted, clueless and muttering his words, was considered a dumbhead by many people and became a subject of ridicule and bullying. A while back, he was told off by a girl introduced to him by a match-maker, calling him a dodo. But Teacher Liu said his naiveté was essential for an artist, treasured by all great masters. That day, Teacher Liu saw the painting of a bird by Liu Yunfan —a parrot that had just died. As he grieved for the bird, I urged him to make a painting of it as a memento. The painting turned out to be very ugly, so I tossed it away. But Liu Yunfan had kept a photo of it and showed it to Teacher Liu. Staring at the painting, Teacher Liu proclaimed Liu Yunfan a genius. I didn’t believe it. We once enrolled him in an art class, and saw him disregard all perspectives and proportions. The teacher wasn’t critical, but his classmates made fun of him, so he gave up after a few classes. According to Teacher Liu: good portraits can be painted by any trained hand, but rarely does one come with ingenuity. He envied Liu Yunfan’s uninhibited mind, and said he should take up painting rather than wasting his life away as a security guard. Liu Yunfan agreed on the spot. In my memory that was the first time someone had said something good about him.
"Firefly Flowers" by Liu Yunfan
4
“Make art with heart! Tackle problems on the way! Theories shackle the mind.” Teacher Liu's philosophy is as unconventional as his art. Liu Yunfan took home his first art work, basically a mob of wiggly lines. The second painting was called “The Fields”, with a hint of poetry and philosophy in it, akin to Wallace Stevens' jar in his poem. The third painting "The Earth" began to enthrall. His fourth and fifth paintings showed progress. Teacher Liu was prepared for surprises, but was totally dumbfounded. Liu Yunfan’s brush strokes were churlish, but authentic and bold. Moreover, his feel for color was unambiguous, his conceptualization was great, never failing to reduce complexity to simplicity, zooming into the heart of the matter, revealing down-home truths with his greenness, unveiling amazing artless beauty. At first glance, some of his paintings looked so-so, but on the wall they looked more and more interesting; their shortcomings in the old-school sense had become essential to his art. To the right: The Earth by Liu Yunfan
5
Several weeks had gone by and Liu Yunfan’s creativity didn’t seem to be a fluke; only then did I dare to show my pleasure.
At three years old, he could only say one word, that was “Mama”, diagnosed as delayed language development linked to the center cord of his brain. Our well-meaning relatives and friends privately advised us to have another child, to help take care of Liu Yunfan in the years to come. We said "no" resolvedly as it would be unfair to pass on our responsibilities to his younger sibling. Therefore, my wife gave up her job to look after him and to help him become self-sufficient, which has been our common goal. Friends who knew our pain then would understand our happiness at this juncture.
6
Exhausted from writing, I would come to sit in the living room. The walls are covered with his paintings. To shield them from the sun, wind and rain, I close all curtains.
In fact, there isn’t any need for windows because each painting opens into a brand new world. "Irises” was painted for the three iris plants I brought back from the deep mountains in Sangzhi a hundred kilometers away. The bundle had about a dozen leaves and similar number of flowers, but his painting shows only two leaves and two flowers. I thought perhaps he was too lazy to elaborate. The main object was green, but he also gave it a green background, against orthodoxy. I refrained from criticizing him. However, on the wall, the green leaves and the green background refract on each other, like the emerald from Yunnan, all the more touching and mysterious the longer you look at it. Two small flowers— one in bloom the other still a bud, are like two sullen personalities, back to back, pitifully sweet. That painting is one of my favorites. "Red Rock Ridge" was his first plein-air piece. That day, the sun was bright, the sky was blue and wide, the temperature was 32 degrees. The pebble beach of Lishui River had an unobstructed view. My only desire was for him to finish the painting, to foster the idea that the pursuit of art involved sacrifice. Being a manual laborer over the years, enduring hardship was nothing for him. There I watched before my eyes a blank canvas being infused with tension, weight and warmth. He used simple dark blue strokes to depict the river, and, breaking all convention, added lemon yellow to it.
Teacher Liu said this painting had got it. Sure enough, the painting’s bold lines and its squarely and full layout combine to produce an uncompounded magnificence. This is one of my favorites, too. Although called Red Rock Ridge, the mountain is actually dark red, made of sandstone with moss growing, therefore appearing blackish red. In Liu Yunfan’s painting, the mountain’s red pigment is fearlessly saturated, looking bright red, completely distorted; however, with just a glance my wife, still back home a long way away, recognized it as Red Rock Ridge, which she had visited only once.
In the evening, after playing basketball, we came back to sit in the living room, and I found a chance to ask him about his paintings.
What kind of flower is this? Firefly flower. He said. I asked him where did firefly flowers grow.
He said he imagined it. He felt there ought to be such flowers in the world, so he painted them.
He said let them exist, and they came to life, out of nothing.
For a moment, he was the creator, creating firefly flowers, with a yellowish glow, swimming like tadpoles.
The piece "Life" has a flower in some murky amniotic fluid like a trembling child in the uterus, as if bowing and apologizing to the glassware, as if paying homage to the uterus, clearly a good portrayal of Liu Yunfan himself. In "Grapes”, the subject was on the plate, but Liu Yunfan gave them wings to fly, with yellow sand and red rocks at the bottom, like a king reigning over the world. His “Sunflower" lacks zeal compared to Van Gogh’s. His flower looked frail, lonely, and sad, without the passion in Van Gogh’s painting. In ”Through Time and Space", he showed a green meteorite floating at the margin of time and space, as if carrying the first or the last hope of life. “Earth” has pleasing colors, but also gives the impression of struggle. The bunch of white flowers really want to break through the imprisonment of the vase to rejoin the earth, but the glass is too thick. "Flowers and Glass" suggests a different outlook: the flower is on fire, vibrant and profuse; the glass jar looks wobbly soft as if it could melt at any time, a sharp contrast to the flower. In “Roses", the boundary vanishes between the flowers and the glass. They meld into a mandolin, sharing a warm rhythm, just like when prison guards and prisoners dance together. In "Heavy Rain", the fat raindrops have a bomb-like texture, like the rain I braved on my motorbike through Qinghai-Tibetan Plateau. In "The Fields”, there was a basket of stones in the wilderness, reminding me of Wallace Stevens' “Anecdote of the Jar”...
”The wilderness rose up to it,
And sprawled around, no longer wild.
The jar was round upon the ground
And tall and of a port in air.
It took dominion everywhere.
The jar was gray and bare.
It did not give of bird or bush,
Like nothing else in Tennessee.”
"Evening Cherry Blossoms" depicts the cherry tree downstairs; the branchlets, so heavy with flowers, that they break in light rain. This species of cherry tree does not bear fruit, which reminds me of people who sacrifice everything just to look pretty. I found a broken twig and put it in a vase at home, hoping its beauty would last a few extra days. It was indeed a blessing in disguise because Liu Yunfan preserved it on his canvas. He even housed it in his favorite jar with a spiral color background. Now the beauty for which the tree sacrificed everything would last forever. The three fish in "Fish" are like a family. They recently escaped the terrifying deep sea to swim in the shallows in white light. Naturally, I am the biggest and the last fish, with tears in my eyes. Do fish cry? I don't know, but I would. When Liu Yunfan was five years old, I stayed at home full time to teach him language. One day we were working on a poem:
“All birds have flown away, so high.
Lonely cloud drifts on, so free.
Gazing at Mount Jingting,
nor am I tired of him, nor he of me.”
After 136 repetitions, a number that I could never forget, he still jumbled the words, forgot the lines, without perceiving the meaning; but he tried and tried tirelessly. I pretended that I needed a bathroom break, but couldn’t stop tears rolling down my face in the corridor.
Why is there a white ball in the middle of "Azalea"? Like a spot with flaking paint. I tried three times to persuade him to change it to to the more pleasing yellow. He said it couldn’t be changed, it needed to be white. I asked again, and he, being slow with words and feelings, still couldn’t explain.
When he said it couldn’t be changed, it meant it couldn’t be changed.
In the canvas of fifty by forty centimeters, let him be his own god.
7
Beauty, like religion, teaches us to be kind.
Compared with a year ago, Liu Yunfan seems a new person.
He has quit smoking, alcohol and beetle nuts. Apart from painting, he attends classes informally. He goes to different classes, sometimes repeating the same class of mine three times, but who knows if he absorbs them or not even though he always has a notebook with him. The rest of the time, he mails books out for me, prints documents for me, fills out forms, plays football, and does laundry and cooking for the family. He also writes a poem each week. The latest one is “Cooking Fish":
“First add a little oil
then plonk in the carp to fry
transfer it into water to boil
and simmer
next is to eat it
Fish is delicious
they say fish recharges the brain and IQ
particularly suitable for me.”
Mundane inventory, consistent ho-hum, without any technique.
He put it all down without thinking too much. Sending it off to circulate among his friends, he went out to play basketball.
either with a tope, wooden yardstick, leather or metal ruler.
I guesstimate it with my spirit: this building I call home
is three hundred meters from the sea, the sound of seagulls
often wakes me at night.
Sometimes I go to the ocean’s shore to watch
the waves waving their arms at me from afar,
but my heart is not stirred.
Ah, the sea, an aqueous desert, men-eating water.
Those died at the sea from thirst
never received an apology from it.
Oh, the sea, revered drunken god,
crouching under the black reefs behind my house,
expires a dizzying spell.
I do not live off the sea,
therefore our association is rather uncomplicated.
Whoever feels like flattering it or cursing it, please go ahead.
I’ve heard from local fishermen that
the sea seldom surges over the cliff to repay men a visit,
but oftentimes sends out piratical winds to give women headaches.
I wish it would rush up once and whip up thunder
and lightning, roaring and hurling omens of destruction,
like the sandstorms I saw in the desert.
Translated by Meifu Wang and Guy Hibbert
Simultaneously broadcast in China via WeChat (微信) by our partner — China's Poetry Journal(诗刊): https://wemp.app/posts/2aa31f02-596a-4006-a524-bec76b56280f
were you still remorseful about your zealous youth?
"In the warm glow of the atonement stars,
I say my prayers, giving my gratitude.”
Terrestrial and aquatic forces, wind and fire surge against entropy.
How did shrimps die? How did ants die?
Life is an off-chance, as fluky as a blind deep-sea turtle running into driftwood,
but how fast it grows and decays —
after breakfast comes lunch, and it will be dinner again soon.
Thinking about this, evening prayers…
Thinking about how to be
unfathomable in old age, as Goethe put it,
shall we never to forget, not for a minute,
those who have pained us?
*Translator’s note: Liang Zongdai (1903–1983) was a Chinese poet and translator, one of the most popular poets writing in free verse in early 20th Century.
Translated by Meifu Wang with Guy Hibbert
Simultaneously broadcast in China via WeChat (微信) by our partner — China's Poetry Journal(诗刊): https://mp.weixin.qq.com/s/-AHWO0P1TfjCNwLetFLKNw
He is seldom sloppy, almost always precise in every step,
his timeworn hands can still chisel out the prettiest waves.
The unused scrapes have a residual life,
the rest were sent to the crematoriums.
Some wood shavings floated up and down,
smelling of decay already;
some saw dust stays on his head like snow
that refuses to be shaken off.
He traces back and cross-examines every piece of wood;
each piece is a unique piece,
nicely textured, elegant and sleek.
The finished pieces sit on another side, waiting for their final
adornment, their bridal gowns.
Now, a few things are coming to a conclusion.
This time when the door opened,
someone absent for thirty years appeared.
His adversary finally came after thirty years.
Already old, he handed him a cigarette
and lit it for him:
“Ah, it's time to have my coffin made.”
Translated by Meifu Wang & Michael Soper
Simultaneously broadcast in China via WeChat (微信) by our partner — China's Poetry Journal(诗刊): https://wemp.app/posts/2aa31f02-596a-4006-a524-bec76b56280f
and walk along its ridge. Fair-weather cumulus clouds overhead,
sun's rays reaching down like tight rubber bands,
with one end on the earthly broadleaf trees.
We sit down,
not thinking of going farther. In the distance,
two birds zoom in and out of a closed atmospheric cell.
We continue to chat, investigating the grass around us.
The moist air is being lifted up along the mountain face,
we therefore should expect rain.
We retrace our steps, trampling on the grass
that has just recovered from our weight earlier. Leaving the mountain,
our cleats step in and out of potholes until reaching the main road
that would take us back to our home in town.
Soon, we see our brilliant father tuning into the city channel
transmitted by the TV tower on the mountaintop.
Translated by Meifu Wang & Michael Soper
Simultaneously broadcast in China via WeChat (微信) by our partner — China's Poetry Journal(诗刊): https://wemp.app/posts/2aa31f02-596a-4006-a524-bec76b56280f
Could he have seen me? Could I be Li Po’s extra poem.
When a dream turns around, it’s time to wake up.
When a river turns around, time returns to ancient days.
When a road turns around and around,
it becomes a winding mountain road.
Can a mountain also turn around? How much effort would that take?
“Hui” means to go back, the word that appears in Huishan and Huijia
— to go back to the mountain or to go home.
If a mountain wants to go home, it will turn around.
But why am I here, in a town with a name like "Go-Back Mountain?"
All I want is to have a drink where Li Po once looked back.
A glass of wine hides a universe, and the time bygone.
The vintage wine that Li Po got drunk on, let me see, what was its name?
What question is it? Everyone knows it’s called Homesickness.
Notes:
* Huishan (literally translated into Go-Back Mountain) is in Zhejiang province
** Liangzhu: The Butterfly lovers, tragic love story of a pair of lovers Liang Shanbo and Zhu Yingtai. One possible rendering of the second line: "Liang Shanbo looked back and saw his Zhu Yingtai." "A butterfly looked back and saw another butterfly..."
Translated by Duck Yard Lyricists, a group of devoted poetry lovers: Meifu Wang, Michael Soper, Peter Micic & Johan Ramaekers
Simultaneously broadcast in China via WeChat (微信) by our partner — China's Poetry Journal(诗刊): https://mp.weixin.qq.com/s/QEh3g2tKINapicrhhVkKWA
I gave a rufescent wool sweater to a jackstraw. Since then, all the migratory rufescent birds startled when they saw me—those flying north, as well as those flying south. Then, as if with team spirit, they boldly opened and flapped their wings.
The rufescent birds in flight were staggered to see me—the single flier, as well as those in a flock.
When I went abroad —certainly you might take it as going into exile— that same year in September, Mother pulled out yarn from a train of burning clouds to knit the rufescent ribbed sweater for me.
She gave it to the jackstraw for the long trip in the winter, because the color represented the rufescent hope of a migratory bird, flying north, towards my native home, the eternal home.
The rufescent birds startled when they saw me—those with songs, as well as the silent ones.
Translated by Duckyard Lyricists, a group of devoted poetry lovers: Meifu Wang, Michael Soper, and Guy Hibbert
Simultaneously broadcast in China via WeChat (微信) by our partner — China's Poetry Journal(诗刊): https://mp.weixin.qq.com/s/KUrC8rQDILbza6CDCSgq0Q
Cold spring days, they always give the alley a romantic look.
Cold spring days, they always deaden the camphor trees.
That year you bought The Three Musketeers,
the other year your father saw a ghost in the alley.
These days when we talk about memories, we are
professing midlife. Ah well, in middle school
a raindrop spattered on the desk, it was wiped off.
In middle school, a raindrop splashed on the textbook,
it was wiped off, and a girl fell for the geography teacher;
what could we do?
Ah well, years later, you fell in love with the pine trees.
Nothing in the world compares to this
view, this serenity, this intimacy, and liberty;
only the pine trees are worthy of this airy golden age.
Translated by Meifu Wang & Michael Soper
Simultaneously broadcast in China via WeChat (微信) by our partner — China's Poetry Journal(诗刊): https://wemp.app/posts/2aa31f02-596a-4006-a524-bec76b56280f
of a needle. A mystery hidden in a thick riverbed,
similar to the formation of amber.
Flower fairies dance in thousands,
fanning honey, giving it the clarity of a child’s eyes.
How their golden wings arouse feverish dreams —
a golden atrium, bathing in silky golden rays.
Watch that golden swarm from flower to flower,
count the teary eyes of flower romancers.
A beekeeper is hooked on the venom of flowers.
I guard my spoonful of gold.
Not a word, except to listen to the buzz on the window,
once, twice, thrice...
Translated by Meifu Wang & Michael Soper
Simultaneously broadcast in China via WeChat (微信) by our partner — China's Poetry Journal(诗刊): https://wemp.app/posts/2aa31f02-596a-4006-a524-bec76b56280f
but its crashing waves can't subdue the urban furor.
First a short holler, then a long howl, followed by a hoot,
it is a huckster with a head of ruffled hair.
It takes only spare change to hire him, to pass on
a scrap of our fortune to this tobacco-puffing drudge,
shouldering two baskets of duckweed with a pole,
while the only weight on us is the ferry ticket.
In this world, some sentiments live on
while the rest dissolve in the evening rain.
It is said, go to Chongqing if you are downhearted,
the hot pot there is the last romance for the mortals.
Translated by Meifu Wang and Michael Soper
Simultaneously broadcast in China via WeChat (微信) by our partner — China's Poetry Journal(诗刊): https://wemp.app/posts/2aa31f02-596a-4006-a524-bec76b56280f
Simultaneously broadcast in China via WeChat (微信) by our partner — China's Poetry Journal(诗刊): https://wemp.app/posts/2aa31f02-596a-4006-a524-bec76b56280f
Those people and things I commingled with, and those I only leafed through,
those monotonic friendship and the flamboyant ones,
the melancholy or quandary that I alone know,
how reliving them is useless but indispensable.
To someone like me, a bad case of delusion and nostalgia,
the frail inner castle is held up only by memories.
For example, right now, I am missing an old friend,
seeing him as the foundation of my ailing kingdom
that's eroding fast but having no way of stopping the runoff.
Translated by Meifu Wang & Michael Soper
Simultaneously broadcast in China via WeChat (微信) by our partner — China's Poetry Journal(诗刊): https://wemp.app/posts/2aa31f02-596a-4006-a524-bec76b56280f
to slow down the burn, to stop the fire from flaring up;
the long road doesn’t really need a blazing light.
Along the way, he continues to regulate the flame
and leads us through the night.
We talk to each other on the way,
two shadows with blurry faces,
in low voices, and our footsteps are also light.
The torch can reignite itself
when it grows dim as there are still sparkles in the ash.
Finally it burns steadily, and we’re almost home.
Father shakes his wrist, sending the ash to fly in the wind
— no need to save the barks anymore, no longer dreading
the journey as if caught in a dire strait. The flame is roaring,
shining beautifully on the last stretch of our road.
We look radiant ourselves as if walking out from a giant halo.
Translated by Duck Yard Lyricists, a group of devoted poetry lovers: Meifu Wang, Michael Soper, Peter Micic & Johan Ramaekers
Simultaneously broadcast in China via WeChat (微信) by our partner — China's Poetry Journal(诗刊, Beijing, China): https://mp.weixin.qq.com/s/m9b-721XvVzV_Za3CH5BfQ
Their stalks, a leaf or an array of leaves, do nothing but look green and daydream.
Who knows, but the small hoe by the wall may curiously grow into an orchid.
Of course I can do the same — sit here for an hour or longer. Eyes closed,
letting the sun diffuse the knolls in me, wholeheartedly.
The music is beating faster than the tears can fall: there’s an urgency in it, more than how the seeds feel in the soil
to outgrow the rotting roots and stalks, and do what orchids do,
poised and comfortable with themselves.
Translated by Meifu Wang & Michael Soper
Simultaneously broadcast in China via WeChat (微信) by our partner — China's Poetry Journal(诗刊): https://wemp.app/posts/2aa31f02-596a-4006-a524-bec76b56280f
with your eyes’ yardstick, but don’t let it weaken your knees.
Every mountain pass and every tight curve
throws you to the precipice of falling, leaving you in pieces.
Luckily a swaying roadhouse awaits on the hillside.
Luckily a strong tea slakes your thirst before the summit.
The higher you go, the closer you are to an irenic world,
under a lighter weight of time…
Translator’s note:
Yardstick Mountain is a peak in Mingshan Mountain Range in southwest China. It is famous for its upright profile, like a vertical yardstick, hence the Chinese name Tiechi Liang (Yardstick Mountain) and the Tibetan name Tiejie Ri (Shining Forehead).
Translated by Duckyard Lyricist, a group of devoted poetry lovers: Meifu Wang, Michael Soper, and Guy Hibbert
Simultaneously broadcast in China via WeChat (微信) by our partner — China's Poetry Journal(诗刊): https://mp.weixin.qq.com/s/XTVl3JPbeNqw8yBD_F4Qng
walking under them, carrying a shoulder basket or maybe not;
the golden needles under his feet are medicinal
with psychedelic effects, like the fog in front of you.
How do you imagine things not seen before: pines, all elegant?
A tunnel without an end. Easy to think of it
as in a labyrinth of words. Imagining a bridge
spanning midair with car wheels slowly rolling.
Imagine a monotone old cat striding gracefully
on the ridge of the mountain, staring at
things unseen.
Note: Driving down China’s Highway G60, from Shanghai to Kunming, one will pass by Elegant Pines Tunnels No. 1 and Elegant Pines Tunnel No. 2, with a bridge spanning midair connecting the two tunnels.
Translated by Meifu Wang and Michael Soper
Simultaneously broadcast in China via WeChat (微信) by our partner — China's Poetry Journal(诗刊): https://mp.weixin.qq.com/s/z6TQ7P6kfIEkA3wawbrWCQ
all its leafy twigs gone. Although new shoots grow
on old wounds, they swish and rustle with a Beijing twang.
I have been practicing my hometown dialect,
mostly in deep woods or on someone's farmland.
I hope to regain my mother's lilt
that echoed through the mountains
especially when she called us for dinner. I am an absent son,
missing home-cooking, dreaming of returning
to my elderly father, to the sounds of Nature,
to resemble a graceful cornstalk; the wind
has carried my longings far, far away.
I have been practicing my hometown dialect
for fear my kinsmen would treat me like an out-of-towner
if I err in speech when I finally go home again.
Translated by Meifu Wang & Michael Soper
Simultaneously broadcast in China via WeChat (微信) by our partner — China's Poetry Journal(诗刊): https://wemp.app/posts/2aa31f02-596a-4006-a524-bec76b56280f
Passing the tropical rainforest, I arrive at Banda Aceh*.
October is the coolest, the most delightful month.
The silver beach, the smell of cappuccino,
the island wearing a glittering shawl,
am I looking at the same seagulls
flying northwest to the far side of Sumatra? Against the iridescent sky,
a tall ship is sailing in, looming over Noazi River mouth.
I remember the ancient who went out to the Western Seas^
from a country revered by tribes across the world;
they say it was October when he returned for the seventh time,
greeted by braying seagulls and a cadre of coconut trees.
Today, I loiter around the estuary of Noazi river,
waiting to catch the fast ferry to Budaken Island,
and finally see the seagulls,
but I sink into a moment of melancholy
because these gulls no longer fly to the distant lighthouses,
but seem to circle over the beach, ever and ever.
Translator’s note:
*Banda Aceh, a city on the tip of Sumatra Island, Indonesia
^ Between1405 and 1433 CE, Chinese mariner Zheng He commanded expeditionary voyages to Southeast Asia, Indian subcontinent, Western Asia, and East Africa.
Translated by Duck Yard Lyricists, a group of devoted poetry lovers: Meifu Wang, Michael Soper & Guy Hibbert
Simultaneously broadcast in China via WeChat (微信) by our partner — China's Poetry Journal(诗刊): https://mp.weixin.qq.com/s/mW4UGWqLAxovMM34TyDriA
Often reminiscing, the bright bamboos outside the window, and a drizzle,
a farmer playing a flute as he herded his ducks home,
a boat moored overnight on the riverbank,
sparse stars, and a new sickle moon.
Returning home
in a dream, lingering by a ragged cliff,
where father looked smaller and smaller
as he raised a silk lamp with painted orchids
to light the way for his daughter married off to another world.
But her longings are locked in,
how she envies the swallows, returning to home eves every spring,
making nests, singing, singing.
Spring’s clear water, breeze in the willows,
young women by the painted boats,
dainty-looking like wisps of clouds
and as refined as the crescent moon.
From the sky the raindrops fall, and take with them
the white sallow flowers to the ground, a pity to see.
Translator’s note:
This poem is a play on words of a poem titled Remembering Parting Words By the Window 临江仙 长记碧纱窗外语 by a Manchurian poet Nara Singde (纳兰性德)in Qing Dynasty.
Translated by Duck Yard Lyricists, a group of devoted poetry lovers: Meifu Wang, Michael Soper, Peter Micic & Johan Ramaekers
Simultaneously broadcast in China via WeChat (微信) by our partner — China's Poetry Journal(诗刊): https://mp.weixin.qq.com/s/gIshlF3B_Uu_FntCcRMczA
how they began by professing their love for stones,
preferring this over that, then one day they became connoisseurs,
loving this over that, then they became true aficionados without knowing.
Among the stone collectors I met was a middle-school teacher,
now retired, but when still a missy,
this Mongolian teacher, by the name of Tuya,
traveled places all over Yingen Sumu, Uliji, Chagan Zadege
to find stones like men did.
She had a soft spot for yellow jasper,
loved an agate only if it’s spotless,
pure red or pure white.
She didn’t believe all jade needed polishing:
a true lover of stones
do no harm the stones.
She made her son
bring out a box and another box of stones
for us to choose,
not because she had outgrown them,
but because of money worries,
she must endure the parting pain.
I could sympathize with her.
Before we agreed to a deal,
she pondered our intentions
as we pondered her agony.
Translated by Meifu Wang & Michael Soper
Simultaneously broadcast in China via WeChat (微信) by our partner — China's Poetry Journal(诗刊): https://wemp.app/posts/2aa31f02-596a-4006-a524-bec76b56280f
Under northern trees, there is a trace of cool breeze.
An eagle spreads its wings, circling in the air.
The haystacks are all gone, only a few sparrows are still here.
The garlic patch is brimming with little white flowers.
In the straw cage, crickets are chirping loud and bright.
A yellow dog lies at the doorway, stretching out its tongue, panting
The ox chews its cud, sparrows chirp in the fruit trees.
Magpies fly over the courtyard wall. The clouds seem to stir without moving.
Sitting on a step under the eaves in my small family courtyard,
I feel, at last, level like a vat of water, an indescribable feeling—
a cup of Pu'er tea, a bowl of noodles, a savory dish,
the scorching midday sun, a few simple words exchanged.
Translator's note:
The lunar calendar divides a year into 24 climatological intervals; each interval is 15 days—-from new moon to full moon or full moon to new moon. The interval of Lesser Heat starts on the first new moon after Summer Solstice.
Translated by Duck Yard Lyricists, a group of devoted poetry lovers: Meifu Wang, Michael Soper, Peter Micic & Johan Ramaekers
Simultaneously broadcast in China via WeChat (微信) by our partner — China's Poetry Journal(诗刊):https://mp.weixin.qq.com/s/0Ekbf9oGd9_Kud8oUhpedg
to spend time with loved ones, to eat assorted kebabs he made.
The discussion turned to soccer, vegetable garden, fine-brush painting,
and nine ways of slow-cooking cutlassfish.
Love affairs were treated as a matter of the mind.
On the other end of the phone, rain was pouring down.
The discussion turned lively:
which shop was cleaner;
what flowers to make a room romantic;
for the first rendez-vous, should it be in a cafe or bed?
As they chatted, there stood Shanhai Mountain Pass**,
the rebel king had broken the defense line,
smoke signals were burning around Coal Hill,
outside Beijing’s Xizhimen Gate***.
What do you say, shall we talk on the phone tonight?
He texted back in-between selling beers: Sweetie, I won’t be home
until the football match ends at midnight.
On the riverbank of Songhua River, he and his friends had nothing to do;
one of them, who would die within two months,
said to everyone playfully:
After I leave tonight,
I won't be returning tomorrow nor the day after.
Never to return would be that moonlight tonight,
the dinner dishes he painted for his girlfriend,
and the lovely smell of Russian bread and Borscht soup from the kitchen.
In the moonlight of another city, his girlfriend read a story to her child.
A cozy, home-like scene?
Not everybody thought so.
The phone made a clanking sound,
hanging up on all love.
No reasons given, no warning signs,
the man who sold beer by Songhua River
fell into deep sleep; it's said he didn't have even 100 yuan on him.
Translator's notes:
*The Songhua River is over 1,400 kilometers long and flows from the Changbai Mountains on the China-North Korea border through Jilin and Heilongjiang provinces in China's northeast.
**Shanhai Pass is one of the major strategic passes along sections of the Great Wall of China, located in the northern province of Hebei.
***The Emperor Chongzhen (r. 1628-1644) hanged himself from a tree on Coal Hill in Jingshan Park, a park located behind the northern gate of the Forbidden City. It was from the Gate of Military Prowess that the Emperor exited the northern gate and made his way to Coal Hill.
Translated by Duck Yard Lyricists, a group of devoted poetry lovers: Meifu Wang, Michael Soper, Peter Micic & Johan Ramaekers
Simultaneously broadcast in China via WeChat (微信) by our partner — China's Poetry Journal(诗刊): https://mp.weixin.qq.com/s/OmDz9uVH6xjMBkRtGgXVhQ