Life in poetry

Poet Ya Hsien's poem "Red corn"

In the years of the last emperor the wind kept blowing

Ten richest Chinese authors in 2013

The writing dream of a blind youth

blowing on a string of red corn

It was actually right beneath the eaves

that it was hung

as if the whole North

the sadness of the whole North

were hanging there

Recalling those afternoons when we played truant

snow had chilled the private schoolmaster's ruler

my cousin's donkey was tied beneath the mulberry tree

Recalling the time when the suona began to sound

and the Taoist priests kept chanting

Grandfather's spirit had not yet returned from the capital

Recalling the cricket's calabash stacked away in the padded jacket

a tiny bit of cold, a tiny bit of warmth

and the copper hoops rolling over the knoll

in the distance we saw grandma's buckwheat field

and burst into tears

It was actually that kind of red corn

that was hanging there for a long long time

right beneath the eaves

when the wind was blowing, in the years of the last emperor

You will never understand

that string of red corn

the way it was hanging there

and its color

not even my daughter who was born in the South will understand

not even Verhaeren

Recalling the present

I have already grown old

strings of red corn are hanging

under the eaves of memory

the winds of 1958 will keep blowing

strings of red corn will keep hanging there.

-Translated by N.G.D. Malmqvist

The original Chinese version:

宣统那年的风吹着

吹着那串红玉米

它就在屋檐下

挂着

好像整个北方

整个北方的忧郁都挂在那儿

犹似一些逃学的下午

雪使私塾先生的戒尺冷了

表姊的驴儿就拴在桑树下面

犹似唢呐吹起

道士们喃喃着

祖父的亡灵到京城去还没有回来

犹似叫哥哥的葫芦儿藏在棉袍里

一点点凄凉，一点点温暖

以及铜环滚过岗子

遥见外婆家的荞麦田

便哭了

就是那种红玉米

挂着，久久地

在屋檐底下

宣统那年的风吹着

你们永不懂得

那样的红玉米

它挂在那儿的姿态

和它的颜色

我底南方出生的女儿也不懂得

凡尔哈仑也不懂得

犹似现在

我已老迈

在记忆的屋檐下

红玉米挂着

一九五八年的风吹着

红玉米挂着

 

 

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