Coming Across an Old Photograph
It was 1979, three years after
the end of the Cultural Revolution
and you stood amid the ruins
of the Yuanmingyuan, a young poet
striking a tragic, martyred pose
among the stones and surviving pillars
(I'm sorry, what an awkward
photograph to be remembered by)
Here in Beijing, all these years later,
I don’t often visit the Yuanmingyuan.
They long ago ceased to be
my ruins, and finally I seem to be someone
who has broken free from stone. Though
once in a while I do like to go walking there,
especially on a frosty day.
It is quiet there in the winter sunlight,
among the fire-blackened stones soothed by snow,
the bare, hardy trees
and the chattering of the magpies,
the frozen pools and upside-down boats.
I like to walk there and think about
the ways my life has gone to waste
and when I walk there
I no longer need anyone by my side.
December 2016, Beijing
About the translator
Austin Woerner is a Creative Fellow in Chinese-English literary translation at the University of Leeds.