Hometown - Liu Xiangdong / 刘向东

Liu Xiangdong / 刘向东





Hometown

They say I'm already a poet—
a poet of the native soil,
earthy to the bone. Yet here I am,
spending the night in a VIP hotel close to home,
and still my hometown visits me in dreams.
I think back to my elders and brothers
who, hungry in those years, fled east of the pass.
When they left, each slumped by the wicker gate,
sold the cooking pots, left the old house standing,
letting the green hills mend the gaps in its walls.
One day they returned—
some dazzling with pearls and silk,
some carrying children and ragged bundles,
some still walking on fallen leaves to this day.
And I,
spending the night in a VIP hotel so near home—
my hometown still haunts my dreams.




家 乡

据说我已经是诗人了
一个乡土诗人
土得要命。而我
在离家很近的贵宾楼过夜
家乡依然在我梦中

回想我的父老兄弟
当年饿着肚子闯关东
临走一个个瘫在柴门
把锅卖了，留下老宅
让青山补墙头之缺

有一天他们回来了
有的珠光宝气
有的背着儿孙和破烂行李
有的至今在落叶上行走

而我
在离家很近的贵宾楼过夜
家乡依然在我梦中




***




Liu Xiangdong, member of China Writers Association, was born on May 5th in 1961 in Xinglong County of Hebei Province. He is vice president of China Poetry Society, vice president of the Writers Asso¬ciation of Hebei Province, editor-in-chief of Poetry Selection and an excellent expert of Hebei Province. Since 1979, he has published 28 books including Chinese poems and prose collections such as Moth¬er's Oil Lamp, Leaves and Birds, The Silence, Black and White and Essays on Poems. He also published Collection of Short Poems by Liu Xiangdong in English, Contemplation of Silence in Japanese and Po¬ems of Liu Xiangdong in Serbian. He has won many prizes including Outstanding Literature Award of China Writers Association, Bing Xin Prose Award, Sun Li Literature Award and Hebei Revitalization Award of Literature and Art. In addition, he has been invited to poetry festivals and poetry-exchange events in many countries such as Germany, Czech Republic and Poland. His poems are organic bodies composed by a great number of aesthetic elements including traditional Chinese and foreign poetics, modern pioneer consciousness, nostalgia for hometown and patriotic feelings. He is adept in grasping poetic intuition and pur¬sues concise but not common expressions so he brings the understand¬ing of life and existence to the creation of poems with vigorous, grave and simple characteristics.


刘向东，1961 年5 月5 日出生，河北兴隆人，中国作家协会会员， 中国诗歌学会驻会副会长、河北省作家协会副主席、《诗选刊》主编， 河北省优秀专家；1979 年开始发表作品，著有中文诗文集《母亲的灯》《落叶飞鸟》《沉默集》《白纸黑字》《读诗记》和英文版《刘向东短诗选》、日文版《推敲沉默》、塞尔维亚文版《刘向东的诗篇》等二十八部；曾获中国作协优秀作品奖、冰心散文奖、孙犁文学奖、河北省文艺振兴奖；应邀出席德国、捷克、波兰等多家诗歌节和诗学交流活动。他的诗是传统中外诗学与现代先锋意识、乡土情结与家国情怀等诸多审美要素的有机体，善于捕捉诗性直觉， 致力于简洁但不简单的表达，从生命、生存现场走向诗歌现场， 具有雄浑大气、朴拙沉实的风骨。