Cicada song
A legend tells of an ancient miracle,
That settled like dust across the Earth.
I hurried to meet it
and scuttled across melting roads,
trampled the gnarled forests, burst calluses
on the mountain crags.
From this day to the next they whispered
that this is life.
When the nights held us,
I clung to the soothing breeze up to
The twinkling sycamores.
We perched there together and told tales
About the other side of here,
Where our ancestors are waiting,
Calling our names.
We smelt the lilies drifting tiredly towards
Into the night.
People would always be busying themselves.
Digging for fist-sized stars that had grown
From the dust. With a rub and a breathe or few
The dirt would fall away,
And you could catch it shimmering.
Pieces cast into the thick thorny scrubs
Flickered into every tiny eye a world.
I once whispered an ancient legend to the moon
For its bedtime story.
It seems so long ago now that I feel
Warm and gooey with the memory on my tongue, my eyes swell with sweetness.
And I remember how, like honey dribbling down the pot, my words spilled
And I spoke and spoke and didn’t know she had fallen sound asleep,
And it was only when I had finished
Did I discover the silence of the fields around us.
And the dream had hatched.
When I gaze on my reflection
The end of me is attached like kite strings.
Primordial energy blows us and lingers
Along the white thread,
Its scent like wildflowers after rain.
I heard them saying that to find it,
This is the way you go,
Behind the wind and rain,
Amongst the silence of the fields.
Translated by Qian Qian and anonymous L