One quick... poem

We talked today in poetry class about Xu Zhimo (徐志摩, 1899-1931), an early mainland vernacular-Chinese poet. He studied in the US and England, most importantly at Cambridge about which he wrote his most famous poem, "Saying Goodbye to Cambridge Again," which is already translated on the above-linked wikipedia page. That poem has been covered in song form by many, including S.H.E.. I took a stab at translating a bunch of the ones we went over in class, but only one seemed to lend itself to translation reasonably enough to put up.

Important to note: the "western sky," or here "western horizon" references the Pure Land Buddhism concept of the "Western Land of Bliss," which wikipedia describes as "a region offering respite from karmic transmigration." Paradise, basically. Anywho, the poem:

闊的海 闊的海空的天我不需要， 我也不想放一隻巨大的紙鷂 上天去捉弄四面八方的風﹔ 我衹要一分鐘 我衹要一點光 我衹要一條縫，－－ 象一個小孩子爬伏 在一間暗屋的窗前 望著西天邊不死的一條 縫，一點 光，一分 鐘。 The Vast Ocean I don't need the vast ocean, the open skies, nor do I want to send up a huge paper kite into the sky to tease the four winds; I just need one quick minute I just need one point of light I just need one thin seam, -- Like a small child climbing up the window in a dark room to gaze upon the undying western horizon's one thin seam, one point of light, one quick minute.

-Xu Zhimo, t. Rob Voigt

change, change, change...

Ran into this one perusing a book of contemporary Taiwanese poetry, by the Hakka poet Zhan Bing (詹冰), born in 1921 in Zhuolan, Miaoli County, Taiwan. It was written on his 70th birthday, and published on August 18th, 1991 in the Taiwan Daily. I took a pretty freely interpretive approach to translating it - it gave me a kind of e.e. cummings feel, and translating several sections quite literally resulted in some cummings-like turns of phrase that I appreciated. Also of course a liberal sprinkling of parentheses (gotta go nuts every now and then, ey?) helps out. Conceit aside, I definitely like the idea of using very directly literal translation occasionally to give a satisfying "strangeness" to passages, so here's my first vague shot at that.

Also, I think quite relevant to this poem, Zhan Bing is one of those extremely interesting authors who grew up in Taiwan during the Japanese colonial period. His childhood education was entirely conducted in Japanese, and with the 1945 "liberation" of Taiwan at the end of the second World War he faced the daunting task of switching from writing in one imposed non-native language (Japanese) to another (Mandarin Chinese). Wow. 變 變，變，變，。。。。。 時時刻刻， 萬物都在變化 自己，社會，人類，地球，宇宙。。。。。 變，我有一則不變的原則： 要變，就愈變愈美好！ 象蓓蕾變成美麗的花朵 象毛虫變成漂亮的蝴蝶 象黑炭變成燦爛的鑽石 象凡人變成慈悲的佛陀 變成真，善，美，愛，是最美好的！ 我要變成追求真理的科學家 我要變成多行善舉的善人 我要變成創造美境的美術家 我要變成充滿愛心的詩人 不然，我的人生毫無意義了 今天滿七十歲的我 日日月月，繼續努力學習 變，變，變。。。。。 change change, change, change..... (time time moment moment), the innumerable things all now changing self, society, humanity, earth, cosmos..... change, I have one unchanging principle: want change (yes the more change the more splendid)! as bud changes to exquisite flower as caterpillar changes to grand butterfly as black coal changes to resplendent diamond as mortal changes to merciful deity change to true, good, beautiful, love, is the most splendid! I want to change into a scientist, in search of the true I want to change into a welldoer, hands held up in compassion I want to change into an artist, creating worlds of beauty I want to change into a poet, brimful of kindness (or else, my this human life, will without meaning become) today filling seventy years this I (day day month month) goes on with the struggle of learning change, change, change..... -Zhan Bing (詹冰), t. Rob Voigt

The Beginnings of Vernacular Poetry - Hu Shi

Here we are! This will be my first post actually on-location from Taiwan. Thanks to the Fulbright foundation for the hook-up, woot. More specifically, I’m sitting in a hilarious 50’s-style American diner with unlimited coffee refills and free wireless, two blocks from my house. Awwwwwright. This semester is looks like I’ll be auditing a Translation Theories class at Shida, and a Modern Chinese Poetry class at Taida. The rest of my time will be spent doing translations, most of which will go up on here. I’m living in a wonderful apartment right in the Shida Night Market area with three other foreigners, and things are generally going wonderfully so far. Anywho, this isn’t a personal blog, so that’s probably about as much as I’ll mention all that stuff for the duration. E-mail me or whatnot if you wanna talk about life.

Back to poetry – the poetry class I’m auditing at Taida is essentially a chronological survey of Chinese “New Poetry” (新) starting with the May Fourth Movement and moving to the present day. Naturally, we started off with Hu Shi (胡適, 1891-1962), a prominent Republic-era intellectual and writer who studied at Cornell and Columbia before returning to the mainland to commence his “literary revolution” in concordance with the other May Fourthers. I just found out during class that, in fact, Hu Shi fled to the U.S. in 1948 and only returned to Asia - Taiwan, not the mainland - in 1958, to die of a heart attack in 1962 here in Taipei while serving as President of Academia Sinica. I'd always thought of him as quite a mainlander, but turns out I wasn't 100% right about that. Anyway, specifically, the aforementioned "revolution" involved a massive shift from writings in classical to vernacular Chinese. Like the prominence of Latin as a written lingua franca in medieval Europe, until the efforts of writers such as Hu Shi and Lu Xun in the early 20th-century, literature in China written in the classical language and therefore only accessible to upper-crust educated types.

Hu Shi in particular was a vigorous advocate of this extreme shift from the classical language, and advocated for a strong poetic empiricism (詩的經驗主義), that is, a poetics based out of personal experience. As a result, his poems are generally quite direct, repetitive, easily understandable, and made up of very clear language. The poem below entitled “Dreams and Poems” can easily be seen as something of a treatise on this thinking. In all honesty, I’m not terribly into these poems, and particularly the translations, but they’re interesting in that they are some of the very very first vernacular poetry published in Chinese. Funnily, I saw someone post online that Hu Shi's poetry would be "torn apart in the online forums" were it written today. But starting at the start is a fine place to start, ey?

蝴蝶 兩個黃蝴蝶，雙雙飛上天。 不知為什麼，一個忽飛還。 剩下那一個，孤單怪可憐。 也無心上天，天上太孤單。 Butterflies Two yellow butterflies, taking flight as a pair. I don't know why, but one suddenly flew back down. The poor other one, so alone up there, lost the desire to fly, with the sky so lonely. 小詩 也想不相思 可免相思苦 幾次細思量 情願相思苦 Little Poem Perhaps I'd like to not feel longing to avoid this longing's pains. Yet many times I've mulled it over, and I prefer this longing's pains. 鴿子 雲淡天高，好一片晚秋天氣! 有一群鴿子，在空中游戲。 看他們三三兩兩， 　　　回環來往， 　　　夷猶如意，—— 忽地裏，翻身映日，白羽襯青天， 十分鮮麗! Doves Thin clouds in the high sky, late autumn glowing in the trees! Overhead a flock of doves, playing games in the breeze. Look at them in threes and twos, winding as they come and go, unhurried as they please, -- forgetting the earth, turning bodies in the sunlight, white feathers against a blue sky, how splendid!　 人力車夫 警察法令，十八歲以下，五十歲以上，皆不得為人力車夫。 “車子！車子！”車來如飛。 客看車夫，忽然心中傷悲。 客問車夫：“今年幾歲？拉車拉了多少時？” 車夫答客：“今年十六，拉過三年車了，你老別多疑。” 客告車夫：“你年紀太小，我不能坐你車，我坐你車，我心中慘淒。” 車夫告客：“我半日沒有生意，又寒又飢， 你老的好心腸，飽不了我的餓肚皮， 我年紀小拉車，警察還不管，你老又是誰？” 客人點頭上車，說：“拉到內務部西。” The Rickshaw Runner The law dictates that anyone under 18 and over 50 may not work pulling a rickshaw. "Rickshaw! Rickshaw!" It came flying over. The customer saw the runner, and suddenly felt a sadness in his heart. The customer asked the runner: "How old are you? How long have you pulled this cart?" The runner answered the customer: "I'm 16, and I've pulled for three years, no need to worry, sir." The customer told the runner: "You're too young, I can't ride your cart. I'd feel distressed if I rode with you." The runner told the customer: "Sir, I've had no business all day, I'm cold and hungry, and your concern won't fill my belly. The cops don't bother me, so who are you then?" The customer lowered his head and got in, saying: "Take me to the Ministry of Internal Affairs." 夢與詩 都是平常經驗 都是平常影像 偶然湧到夢中來 變換出多少新奇花樣 都是平常情感 都是平常語言 偶然碰著個詩人 變換出多少新奇詩句 醉過才知酒濃 愛過才知情重 你不能做我的詩 正如我不能做你的夢！ Dreams and Poems All ordinary experiences All ordinary images Gushing up by chance in a dream And becoming vast flux of new patterns All ordinary emotions All ordinary language Bumping by chance into a poet And becoming vast flux of new lines Only a drunk knows the richness of wine Only a lover knows the weight of emotion You can't make my poems Just like I can't make your dreams! Hu Shi (胡適), t. Rob Voigt

Exploiting Pears at Midnight

After a brief respite over the past two weeks: This week's entries are from Luo Fu, the first of hopefully many Taiwanese poets to be on this blog. He was born Mo Luofu on mainland China in 1928, in Hengyang, Henan province. In 1949 at the age of 21 he left home for Taiwan as the KMT and nationalists fled a losing civil war with the CCP. Luo Fu graduated from Taiwan's Tamkang University, and his work includes over 30 volumes of poetry. He also was one of the founders of Taiwan's Epoch (创世纪), an important poetry journal, and several sections from his most famous work, one of the first (or the first? I'm not sure) epic poems in contemporary Chinese poetry entitled Death in the Stone Cell (石室之死亡), were selected for inclusion in and translated for Cyril Birch's Anthology of Chinese Literature in the "New Poets of Taiwan" section. I really dug on a bunch of these, and ended up translating a whole chunk from this website, so below are six that I thought worked reasonably. He's got a really cool traditional feel, very very slow-moving at times, reminiscent of traditional Chinese regulated verse or haiku or some such thing. But the themes and style are definitely weirder, more surrealist. It rocks. Lots of fun translation issues, of course. One of the best is the title of the first poem, "carving pears at midnight" (午夜削梨). The third character, xue (削), ostensibly here means "slice, carve, cut, peel," but it is also a character in the word boxue (剥削), "to exploit, take advantage of." So the title has a second meaning: "exploiting pears at midnight." Read the poem and you'll see why this is awesome. Reminds of Georgia O'Keefe or something. Unfortunately I couldn't think of a more sexual way to say it than "carve," can anyone think of one? The title of the second poem is pretty cool as well: I found out that the rather rare term he uses for midnight, zi ye (子夜), also alludes to a Six Dynasties-era female poet who "wrote about the life and feelings of a woman of the night." Hmm, not really a good way to allude to that in English. Still, knowing about it definitely adds a nice extra richness to the poem. Allusions are definitely one of the toughest things about Chinese poetry. For example, I'm basically 100% sure that "birchleaf" in that same second poem, tang (棠), refers to the classical Book of Poetry because of the way it's used. Something about a river as well I think. I've got to look that up. In the meantime, any Chinese friends want to enlighten?

午夜削梨 冷而且渴 我静静地望着 午夜的茶几上 一只韩国梨 那确是一只 触手冰凉的 闪着黄铜肤色的 梨 一刀剖开 它胸中 竟然藏有 一口好深好深的井 战栗着 拇指与食指轻轻捻起 一小片梨肉 白色无罪 刀子跌落 我弯下身子去找 啊！满地都是 我那黄铜色的皮肤	|||	carving pears at midnight cold, and thirsty i quietly gaze upon, atop the midnight table, one korean pear that certainly is an ice-cold tentacled, brass-skin-flashing pear. one slice of the knife: its chest, to my surprise, hides one mouthful of a deep, deep well trembling, thumb and forefinger gently twist a small piece of pear flesh white and guiltless the knife drops, and i bend my body to search ah! the whole ground is all my brass-colored skin
子夜读信 子夜的灯 是一条未穿衣棠的 小河 你的信像一尾鱼游来 读水的温暖 读你额上动人的鳞片 读江河如读一面镜 读镜中你的笑 如读泡沫	|||	midnight, reading a letter the midnight lamp is a small river that’s not yet worn the birchleaf your letter is like a fishtail swimming up to me and i read the water’s warmth read those scales on your forehead read the Yellow and Yangtze, as if reading one side of a mirror i read your laugh in the mirror as if reading bubbles floating
河畔墓园 为亡母上坟小记 膝盖有些些 不像痛的 痛 在黄土上跪下时 我试着伸腕 握你蓟草般的手 刚下过一场小而 我为你 运来一整条河的水 流自 我积雪初融的眼睛 我跪着。偷觑 一株狗尾草绕过坟地 跑了一大圈 又回到我搁置额头的土 我一把连根拔起 须须上还留有 你微温的鼻息	|||	cemetery at the riverbank on visiting my mother’s grave my knee has some pain strangely painless as i kneel on this sand and clay i try to stretch my wrist and grasp your thistlegrass hand so recently descended and for you i bring a whole river of water flowing from my snow-filled, melting eyes i kneel. i steal a look at the foxtail that surrounds the graveyard running a great circle and returning to where my forehead touched the earth and i tear it up by the roots it must, must hold some measure of your breath, still warm
金龙禅寺 晚钟 是游客下山的小路 羊齿植物 沿着白色的石阶 一路嚼了下去 如果此处降雪 而只见 一只惊起的灰蝉 把山中的灯火 一盏盏地 点燃	|||	golden dragon in the temple the late bell, now visitors descend the mountain’s small path sheeptooth ferns alongside the white stone steps the whole journey, chewing things over if it snows in this place we may see a startled gray cicada take the lanterns of the mountain cup by cup, and ignite
洗 脸 柔水如情 如你多脂而温热的手 这把年纪 玩起水来仍是那么 心猿 意马 赶紧拧干毛巾 一抹脸 抬头只见镜中一片空无 猿不啸 马不惊 水，仍如那只柔柔的手 ——一种凄清的旋律 从我的华发上流过	|||	face-washing soft water like a feeling like your greasy, tepid hand that takes this age and plays in the water, still so ape-hearted horse-headed hurriedly twisting the towel dry a wipe of the face raising my head, surprised to see this chunk of emptiness ape unhowling horse unsurprised water, still like that soft hand -- a cold and clear melody flowing out and over my gray hair
剔 牙 中午 全世界的人都在剔牙 以洁白的牙签 安详地在 剔他们 洁白的牙齿 依索匹亚的一群兀鹰 从一堆尸体中 飞起 排排蹲在 疏朗的枯树上 也在剔牙 以一根根瘦小的 肋骨 -洛夫	|||	picking teeth noon all peoples of the world picking their teeth with pure white toothpicks serenely picking their pure white teeth tied to an equal crowd of vultures from amongst pile of corpses taking flight lined up squatting atop the sparse, withered trees and each picking their teeth with a small, thin rib -Luo Fu, t. Rob Voigt

The Not-so-Northern Island

This week's poet I checked out by virtue of his name: Zhong Dao (中岛). Funnily enough, his name translates as "Middle Island," and it is very reminiscent of the well-known and previously discussed Bei Dao. Born Wang Lizhong (王立忠) in 1963, Baoqing County, Helongjiang Province in the far north-east of China, he graduated from the literature department at Harbin Normal University in 1989, and has since then worked as an editor, poet, freelancer, critic, and reporter. Zhong Dao started writing in 1983, and has since been published in dozens of journals and periodicals including People's Literature (人民文学), Shanghai Literature (上海文学), Mountain Flowers (山花) and so on, as well as in various anthologies, books, websites, and all that jazz. Zhong Dao posts to his blog often and continues to publish. The three poems I've translated for today were posted August of last year online at China Poesy (诗词在线). I liked my first taste of Zhong Dao quite a bit. He's a quiet poet, drifting subtly through images and observation... he's one of those poets who engages in slow, careful looking. Each of these poems finds him grasping at a passing moment, trying desperately but unable to keep hold of it. Each carries the unspoken sadness of a moment in time forever lost. Really great stuff. Several fun poetic problems: in "The Ferry Crossing," it seems unclear to me if "一天" means to express "the day" or "the whole sky" (in Chinese tian, 天, can mean either "day" or "sky"), and I think it's likely to mean a bit of both. Earlier in the poem he talks about both "restless days" and the "black stars," so I feel like it might be calling back upon both of those earlier images, and I could find no way to express both simultaneously in English. I went with "day" because it felt stronger to me. Also, in the next line, while tiaodong, 跳动, can mean "beating" as a heart does, in the context I couldn't help but feel he meant to use some of the more literal interpretation - "jumping movement," and so what was one word in Chinese becomes two in English - "jumping, beating."

渡口 紧靠渡口 有一家酒馆 在海浪飘起的时候 就会有几个或大或小的面孔挤贴在 玻璃的窗口上，有些像露出头的鲨鱼 他们的面孔被海浪冲刷着 然后 突然消失 颤抖在一颗颗黑星星下的海洋 飘浮在和拥挤在他们 浮躁的日子里 像渡口的铁锁 敲打着这些 摇晃的身体 一天的焦虑穿过他们的毛孔 穿过所有跳动的心脏 穿过这个渡口 向下一个目标 伸出鳏夫的舌头	|||	The Ferry Crossing Leaning on the ferry crossing, there’s a tavern. When the ocean waves flutter in the air, faces squeeze up, all sizes, glued outside on the glass of the window, like sharks surfacing. The faces are washed clean by the waves, and then they vanish. The seas and oceans shiver under a quilt of black stars, floating in and crowded in their restless days, like the ferry crossing’s iron lock knocking on these swaying bodies. The anxieties of the day pass through their pores pass through all the jumping, beating hearts pass through this ferry crossing on towards the next goal reaching out celibate tongues.
困惑的季节 在墙上 我看见了我自己 像飞翔的鸟 有时又有点像 涌动的龟 那些 似乎乱码的图像 成了现在的五官 存在使更薄弱的心 无法继续表达 一个生命不能安静地 留在他的心里 就像我无法活在自己的血液里 也无法来表达应该表达的 此时的感受	|||	Muddled Season On the wall I see myself like a circling bird, at times a bit like a bobbing tortoise, those cluttered-code images becoming now features of this face. Existence makes weaker hearts incapable of continued expression. But a life can’t quietly sit inside its mind, just like I can’t live in my own blood, though unable to express what I should - the experience of this moment.
那个远方 城市的表情在他的眼前 像鸽子飞走 存在成为回忆的一种 位置停留在窗前的树影上 我停留在你的黄色的裙子里 变迁在神经的语言中抖动 春天在我的身后 跳闪着 是过去的油灯 那个远方 一群陌生的表情 成为我孤独的墙 -中岛	|||	That Distant Place In his eyes, the face of the city is a pigeon taking off, its existence becoming a peculiar memory seated for a time outside the window in the tree’s shade. I pause as well in the folds of your yellow skirt, vacillate and shake as neurons fire word after word. The summer at my back, leaping and sparkling, is an old oil lamp. That distant place - a crowd of strange faces becomes my lonely wall. -Zhong Dao (t. Rob Voigt)

Slaughters

Today's poem was published online at Jintian on April 15. It's written by Pan Xin'an (潘新安), who I'd not heard of before and couldn't really find any biographical info on. Oh well. This one really struck me in the original, and presented some pretty significant translation difficulties. In particular, there's a portion where he uses what I think is a slang term for gambling - 'killing pigs' - that I couldn't find a proper analogue for in English, so apologies if that section's a bit rough. Also, if anyone knows for certain what's meant here by "放炮子," I'd appreciate hearing it.  I took it to mean cheating, but could it also mean "fired a gun"? The "子" is messin' with my head.

All of which brings me to a big thought about this process - screwing things up. I feel basically certain I will wildly misinterpret at least one thing in each poem I try to translate. But hey, that's life. Any Chinese speakers out there, your guidance is beloved. And English speakers, I'd love to hear your thoughts on this (or any translation in the future) just as a poem in English - what works and what doesn't.

杀戮 我亲眼见过的杀戮 从小时候杀鸡开始 但父亲总是叫我转过脸去 印象最深的一次 是看两个收蛇的异乡人 杀蛇取胆 在恐惧中我睁大了眼睛 日常的杀戮无处不在 被杀白的身体 仿佛是它们自己要捧出自己的 肚腹和心肝 而那些爱玩的人 把时下盛行的赌博也戏称为 杀猪 他们总能把一种血腥 表达得诙谐和风趣 那天他被一帮人追赶 最后砍死在菜场的门口 让真正的屠夫们吃了一惊 据说达三十七刀 他是外地人，在赌场上放炮子 在浴室里放小姐 在这个饱受屈辱的国家 如果你是爱国者 你就必须高喊：杀！杀！杀！ 但如果你天生胆小 你就转过脸去 -潘新安

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Slaughters The slaughters I’ve seen started as a child, with chickens - but father always made me turn and look away. The time that affected me most was seeing two poachers from another town kill snakes to get their guts, and in fear I opened my eyes wide. Everyday slaughter is not to be found in those slain, white bodies, looking as though forced to hold with both hands the weight of their own hearts, and entrails. And those people who love to play portray their gambling playfully, calling it  ‘killing pigs.’ They somehow smile at a bloodiness and take it for humor and wit. The day he was chased down by a crowd and hacked to death at the entrance to the market - that made the real butchers swallow their shock. It’s said there were thirty-seven knives. He was from out of town, pulled a con at the casino, fucked a prostitute in the bathroom. Here in this humiliated country, if you’re a patriot, you must scream: kill! kill! kill! But if you were born cowardly, you can just turn and look away. -Pan Xin’an (t. Rob Voigt)

lamps and lanterns

Hi there, my name is Rob Voigt, and this will be a blog containing primarily my translations of contemporary Chinese-language poetry, and generally with a bit of background on the poets in question and links to their work. It'll also include some other random ponderings on Chinese literature, professional translations that I like, and so on. There won't be a ton of critical analysis, hopefully things will mostly speak for themselves. I'll be aiming for one post a week.

To start things off, however, we'll have some translations that are not mine - poems from the ubiquitous and super-cool Bei Dao, literally "Northern Island," real name Zhao Zhenkai. Known as one of the "Misty Poets" for his dense, imagistic style, Bei Dao was one of the founders of "Jintian" (Today), an important poetry magazine that ran from 1978 until it was banned in 1980 (though it is currently back in action). He is one of the best-known contemporary Chinese poets in the West, in particular for his poem "The Answer," which was written during the 1976 Tian'anmen square protests and taken up as something of an anthem during the more infamous 1989 protests. At the time he was in Germany, and was thereafter banned from returning to China.

Today's two poems are "We" and an untitled poem, both found in Bei Dao's collection "Landscape over Zero" (零度之下的风景), as translated by David Hinton and Yanbing Chen. They are the poems from which this blog draws its name, "lamps and lanterns." In "We," Hinton and Chen translate "灯笼" as "lanterns," and in the untitled poem, the first character of that word, "灯," is translated as "lamp."

Lamps, lanterns, light, they're common images and sometimes powerful ones, but as a choice for the blog title I'm hoping to highlight the strange and sometimes non-rational decision-making inherent in the translation of poetry. What is it about those two images that caused Hinton and Chen to use lamp here and lantern there? Is it the connotations in the target language? A more accurate portrayal of the source text? For the map/lamp rhyme? Maybe it's a simple way of making the simple distinction between the two similar but non-identical words in Chinese? Or maybe it was just a feeling.

我们 失魂落魄 提着灯笼追赶春天 伤疤发亮，杯子转动 光线被创造 看那迷人的时刻： 盗贼潜入邮局 信发出叫喊 钉子啊钉子 这歌词不可更改 木柴紧紧搂在一起 寻找听众 寻找冬天的心 河流尽头 船夫等待着茫茫暮色 必有人重写爱 无题 人们赶路，到达 转世，隐入鸟之梦 太阳从麦田逃走 又随乞丐返回  谁与天比高 那早夭的歌手 在气象图里飞翔 掌灯冲进风雪 　 　 我买了份报 纸 从日子找回零钱 在夜的入口处 摇身一变 　 　 被颂扬之鱼 穿过众人的泪水 喂，上游的健康人 到明天有多远      -北岛

We lost souls and scattered spirits holdings lanterns chase spring scars shimmer, cups revolve light's being created look at that enchanting moment a thief steals into a post office letters cry out nails o nails the lyrics never change firewood huddles together searching for an audience to listen searching for the heart of winter river's end a boatman awaiting boundless twilight there must be some one to rewrite love Untitled people hurry on, arrive return in another life, fade into bird dreams the sun flees wheat fields then comes back trailing after beggars who's rivaled sky for height that singer who died young soars in the weather map flies into snowstorms holding a lamp I bought a newspaper got change back from the day and at the entrance to night eased into a new identity celebrated fish move through everyone's tears hey, you folks upstream achievers so hale and hearty how far is it to tomorrow      -Bei Dao, t. David Hinton and Yanbing Chen