THE PURIFICATION FESTIVAL IN APRIL
(A long poem, extracts)
*
… over there, over there where home is
April is in the Purification ceremony
How could you come back with me and stand by the river’s bank tonight?
In painful joy
Loudly sing the water’s eulogy
run
run
run and roll
run and roll and carry all away…
To open the vault to another world.
*
1. Pilgrimage to the other side of the night
They are the last group of pilgrimage
Departing from the night of the last century
Departing – though not driven out by any wind along the border of darkness. Depart.
All efforts have been erased – they walk slowly
Taciturnly like that. Along the last century of the millennium
With the language in dregs hidden in their pockets
And the empty baskets on their heads, they walk
Knowing themselves to be the last people.
They walk – soundlessly
Stop for a rite soundlessly, and read a scripture soundlessly
Even the candles also try to burn without causing a sound.
When all have burned out, they walk
From a faraway village to a faraway village
They see houses built like theirs / but are not theirs
They hear the singing like theirs / but not theirs
The memory of history’s storage is expired – they walk
Very slowly to the other shore, trying to look back at some traces
They resign themselves to bear the unnecessary historic destiny
As the last people.
They walk mingled into darkness / darkness waves its hand to dismiss them
Darkness overflows the way ahead, overflows their faces
They stoop down very low, lower than those abandoned by the rite
Endurance. They huddle up, smaller than their own shadows.
Suddenly two thin, slender arms stretch out
And begin to dance, I see
The movements of the wrists, the hands, and the fingers
to a rhythm beyond seasons
What do those arms want to say? They are overreaching to the utmost
Suddenly they are broken. Their shadows mingle into blacker darkness
Only left is the empty space of the curves extending toward the bright space
The last bright space.
Thus. They depart
No blade of grass raises its head to pay attention to their presence
No dream
The sense of the aged dynasty’s presence bends down their sagged eyes
Without denunciation / and deploration
They walk toward the dark night – the backside of dark night
When the wind sweeps over their native naked hills, their eyes’s shadows fall down
Suddenly the wrinkled and swarthy feet step off from the border
And begin to dance, I see
(I am the last person to see, perhaps)
The dance of fertility of the desert bird
Without anxiety or project / in fury, and with feet above ground
The dance of the last feast.
The last second of the last day.
Of the last month of the last century.
The last blink of the eyes. The last movement of the lips.
The last looking back. The last sorrow.
The last extinction.
The last ashes.
The wind makes efforts for the last gust of blowing.
Translated by Nguyễn Tiến Văn.