From Stagnant Water & Other Poems by Wen Yiduo (BrightCity Books, 2014)
With this new translation, we are given an opportunity to appreciate the internal conflicts that existed within Wen the man: the elitist and the proletarian, the scholar and the activist, the traditionalist and the innovator. These contradictions give Wen’s poetry its singular power, and through Robert’s personal interpretation, we revel in the details of Wen’s work: lyric, ironic, biting, involved, passionate, and above all, politically aware but ideologically free.
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IMPRESSIONS OF AN EARLY SUMMER NIGHT
(May 1922, the time of the warlords)
Sunset bequeaths a troubling night.
The poet forces night to give up its secrets:
Dew scatters beneath the sky’s purple vault;
the poet thinks: beads to be strung for the chests of the dead.
An icy wind rakes the desiccated hair of a starving willow.
Lamplight reflected in a pond twists like a snake.
Hanging mid-mountain, a horribly crippled cypress
stiffly shakes its black, skinny fists, challenges air.
The frogs haven’t slept. Shouldn’t they be tired?
They croak the swamp’s battle hymns even louder.
All those village dogs bark with such agony.
Why can’t they break the courage of the thieves?
A dragon chews fire, spits smoke, claws up an iron ladder.
An army train lugs its war cargo, screams as if alive.
The night watch clangs his bronze-tongued, stone bell,
tells everyone, “Relax, go back to sleep.” And they believe it!
Hey God! Can’t you see this degraded universe?
Can’t you feel its chill? Hey, Benevolent God!
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PEDDLER SONGS
Crow-caws in a dimly lit, twisting alley;
in the eastern sky, a yellow patch followed by blue.
Who hastens the mistress to her dressing table?—
“White Orchids!” “White Orchids!”
A peddler cries beneath the window.
Plane tree shadows spread below a wall.
Cicadas quiet. Into the study float cooking smells.
Who startles the child from his noonday nap?—
“Peppermint Candy!” “Peppermint Candy!”
A small gong clangs below the wall.
Street noise, like boiling water in copper kettles; sunrays
sift through bamboo shades, stipple a screen.
Who disturbs the master while he’s reading?—
“Lotus Seeds!” “Lotus Seeds!”
The aroma drifts through the door.
Evening absorbs the city in peaceful sleep.
Bats scatter, like falling leaves harried by the wind.
Now, who fills the old man’s heart with mystery?—
Listen to him! Listen to him!
A blind fortuneteller plays the huqin.
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SNOW
During the night a snowstorm scatters
down-like flakes, numberless as small pox sores;
it weaves them into a priest’s robe
and stealthily enshrouds the wasted earth,
covering over those who died.
The storm buries the fish scale roofs of houses
but not the pale-blue threads of chimney smoke.
The crooked smoke climbs endlessly
like the souls of Buddhist poets
that break their body’s shell, make off for heaven.
An arrogant storm tramples the world.
The trembling forest creatures struggle a long time.
At last they sight its white uniform
and happily shout, “Peace is here! Our fight’s over!
Can't you see it's Winter's flag of surrender?"
From Perry Link, University of California, Riverside
—
"An eloquent testimony to the violation and destruction of humanity. This revered scholar of aesthetic theories has written not only about his personal suffering in the remote labor camps and the political persecution he and his family experienced, but also about the fates of many common people. Not just a book bearing historical witness, it is authentic literature."
Christopher Merrill, International Writing Program, University of Iowa —
“The virtue of this translation is that it offers a dance, which preserves the essence of the original. Robert Hammond Dorsett is comfortable with the outward trappings of meter and rhyme, devising elegant solutions at every turn and turning.”
Marvin Bell
—
“Robert Dorsett's versions of Wen Yiduo give us access to a writer whose poems feel like fresh air. These translations express beautifully the poet's passionate restraint, his exactitude, and his struggle toward self-definition, the sublime and the mysterious.”