Vol 3 No 1 2009
Translations in English Class
It’s an old poem the one about war about the Tang poet Du Fu the
one everyone
in China loves standing there in springtime as the empire
is in ruins and now
we’re breathing here together but the mountains
and rivers remain and they nod
as you read on saying the cities again are
growing grass everywhere and the trees
and see the soldiers’ signal
fires are still burning it has been three months we’re
in harmony
now need no translation even the flowers worry are crying and I hate
being
away from home the birds startle him yes we all say we’d pay a fortune
for
one letter from our family as he scratches his old hair thinned too
much to hold
his jade hairpin.
The flowers they say
are not crying how could they
it’s not what it says
They argue. They say I got it all, but not the part about the flowers.
That’s not
what it says. That’s not what the poet says.
Flowers don’t cry. It was the poet’s
tears. That’s
exactly it, I say. We mean the same thing. They insist. I
hear in
unison: Du Fu’s tears, not the flowers. The flowers shed tears. As
if I don’t know
my own language. But I insist. It’s what
I say, there’s no difference, I want to yell.
It’s my translation. The
flowers are crying and when I read the poem again there
is no harmony,
nothing is lost in translation, the flowers are crying and the
empire is
in ruins. Even the birds are startled.
The last haiku waits
alone to turn out the lights
wonders where you are
CX Dillhunt
November 2006, Xi’an Jiaotong University, PRC
CX Dillhunt