Youthful Poems: Dining Hall / Cold Crows / Sun

2006/6/15 15:57:56

Once again, let me note that the exact writing dates of these vernacular poems are no longer clear to me, but they were certainly written no later than the second year of middle school. After that, except on rare occasions, I basically stopped writing vernacular poetry and only wrote in classical forms. Moreover, between my second year of middle school and high school, I was mainly composing many Art Songs as well as some Piano Sonatas and early Symphony drafts, leaving even less time for vernacular poetry. Today I'll transcribe three more here, preserved in their original form without any alterations.

Dining Hall

Sitting in a corner of the dining hall,
mechanically chewing, swallowing.
Behind me, the crowd clamors,
endlessly clanging dishes and utensils.

The mouth, gnawing without sensation,
at those things said to delay death,
that just last night were vigorously growing,
this morning still brimming with life.

Tomorrow, these once-vibrant living things
will become rotting flesh on a rigid corpse.
"Eat up, eat up! You won't grow if you don't eat!"
A woman nearby coaxes her child, full of tender love.

A bleak smile — in the dazzling sunlight,
I set down this dark poem.

Cold Crows

"Why are your songs always so mournful,
why are your poems always so bleak?
Can the blazing sun of summer not warm you,
nor the gorgeous blossoms in spring's light bring you joy?

Oh, come now, melancholy one,
come join our revelry."
"No, no! Let me forever be like
the bare branches of winter, wailing between heaven and earth.

The north wind, bitter and fierce, ravages the land at will,
cruel snow and bitter cold mercilessly bury all things —
why must one frolic carefree like a skylark?

Let me instead stand like the Reaper at that desolate grave mound,
draped in a black robe, holding a long pale staff,
tolling the ominous bell for mankind under the radiant spring light."

Sun

Oh, Sun! You spread this invisible golden net
ensnaring all things in the world, eavesdropping, surveilling —
by what right! Your light, your warmth?

Under your radiance, beasts don fine garments
to mask the carnal desires they cannot suppress,
piling on smiles, shrieking in grating pitch.

And your warmth, stirring boundless debauchery —
in your hot wind, every organ of man
opens its blood-red maw, scrambling, tearing.

Ah, Sun, by what right do you reign so high above!
Hypocrisy accompanies your rise, evil trails your descent,
and you, you greatest villain, greatest hypocrite on earth,
put on airs of bestowing grace upon all things to enslave the living.

I am a stagnant pool of foul water,
I will never let you come disturb me,
get down from that throne at once —
in this world, only equality shall exist!