Love Dance - Zhao Si / 赵 四

Zhao Si / 赵 四




Sighs

—for all the slaughtered victims

I hear, I hear the flock of rain, crowing, rushing out of stirred crowds,
a deluge of chaos and fright, laughing, roars of laughter
crashing into the Wailing Wall. Triumphant karma holds a sharp blade
in its mouth and slices the sigh into pieces; one piece, two pieces,
feathers flutter, dancing. You emerge among the whirling sleet.
What is beyond mortal imagination arises –
the appointed time has come –
the sky shatters into snowflakes.
I see, I see the suffering, the dukha of your heart, as it swells up, up
until an angel thunders out; he flexes the roots
of his dark, unfamiliar wings, pressing against the cyclone
from an emptiness in the heart, then bows his head to peck
an immense, petrified world with his sharp beak. Already stone,
you, an enormous sigh, stand upright but burn inside.
A fire wall, a wall of fire burns darkly and damply, smoking
palely and bitterly, collapses, buries, buries the eternal sighs.




叹 息

——为大屠杀死难者

我听见，我听见掉进混乱与惊恐的人群
掠起群集的雨乌鸦，大笑，成群的大笑飞过
撞着哭墙。胜利的业火口含利刃
切割叹息，一片，两片，羽毛飞舞
你出现，出现在漫天大雪中
你们所无法想象的事物出现，时间到了
白色的血滴滴溅起，雪花中最亮的朵朵
我看见，我看见你的大苦之心鼓胀，鼓胀
轰然而出的天使，一边敛紧他尚不熟悉的
大翼翅的根部，顶住从你的内心吹出的风口
一边用尖嘴喙低头凿开偌大的石化世界
已经僵硬的你，如此巨大的叹息矗立内燃
一堵火墙，一堵火墙阴湿地燃烧，冒着
苦涩的白烟坍塌，埋下，埋下永恒叹息



*



Love Dance

Those weary faces are my face, too;
those hopeless hearts, all my heart;
those struggling people struggle inside me;
this tattered world is the clothing I also have to wear;
but earthly happiness fails to satisfy my desiring soul.
Yet, in each illuminating flash of divine creation,
I see that tacit, esoteric congenital hold
that unfolds its illustrious phoenix tail,
buttressing my waist with empathy
in the brutal dance to survive.




恋 舞

那些疲惫的脸也是我的脸，
那些无望的心也是我的心，
那些挣扎的人也挣扎在我的体内，
这个漏洞百出的世界也是我不得不披挂的衣衫，
而那些貌似的幸福却取悦不了我渴求的灵魂。
在创造的神性每一次欣悦的闪光中，
我都看见承接秘密流转的幸福，
伸开它巨大辉煌的凤凰尾翼，
在残酷的生存之舞中，
安慰地稳稳托住了我的腰身。



*



A Dot

Running a race against destruction, nowhere to hide: a dot runs;
destruction blossoms in ellipsis, large dust-flakes rain down;
a dot runs, desperately, heart full from passing through scudded clouds
across the sky, across the fallen homeland, piercing the core of evil
beyond imagination.
An angel looks back; nowhere to shelter; who is demolishing, demolishing
everything with such speed? Homeless, helpless, I run and run and run
at a loss, nowhere to stop,
a dot running on tips of needles, on blades of knives and chopping boards,
a dot, tiny as a conjured mote – all that remains of my soul,
a dot cast by an urgency to survive. Thank God!
I ride and ride and ride a flower parachute, three flower umbrellas,
against waves of spraying dangers, incessant crises that swell, swell, swell…
One must do something! One dot kicks a shot and the bullets fly;
another dot dashes out like a slant shot from a barrel,
another, riding on bees, jumbo mount buzzing about, at least nine dots
break through the nine millimeter pellet lights in the hell-deep towering
of terror. A twinkle of dots fall,
hopes splash in a star burst!
Struggle! Struggle! Take two sewing needles in my hand,
threefold be the curse I weave and weave and weave around disorder’s head,
a bundle of self-preservation, a preaching finger
covers me; I lie down beneath the sky heading against the morning sun and it flames out.




小 朵

奔跑在跟毁灭赛跑，无处可躲，小朵奔跑
毁灭花开朵朵，灰尘的鹅毛大雪黑云压下
小朵奔跑，抵死奔跑，要穿过乱云飞渡，
穿过陷落的家园，穿过邪恶创造力的腰身
天使在回望，无遮无蔽，谁在拆飞速地拆
无家无告，我跑跑莫名究竟地跑，不接地气
针尖上的小朵，刀俎上跑，一小朵
微小如被施法的尘埃，我们仅剩的灵魂
一小朵，被一大坨求生抛出的小朵，谢天
谢地，我乘乘乘花朵的降落伞，三朵花伞
浪花依旧，险象环生增生超生，一定要有
动作，小朵20 号脚下射出油门
让子弹飞奔，小朵13 号旁逸斜出如出枪膛
骑上蜜蜂，巨无霸嗡鸣，宛如九个小朵
在恐惧九重深的巍峨里，穿梭九毫米
如豆灯火，小朵星星点点，垂落
又飙起的希望，火光一闪
争斗，争斗，举起两根缝衣针
我织织织进三重诅咒，与混乱战斗
自救的口袋，一截布道的手指
盖上我，在天空下睡去，向着熄火的朝阳。



(Translated by Bruce Meyer, Xuan Yuan & Tim Lilburn)




***



Dr. Zhao Si, Chinese poet, essayist, translator, poetics scholar, editor, is the author or translator of more than a dozen books, including White Crow (Poems, 2005), Gold-in-Sand Picker (Prose Poems, 2005), Disappearing, Recalling: 2009–2014 New Selected Poems (2016, which won “2014 Ma¬jor Support Project” by China Writers Association), Matchstick Man (New York, 2017, nominated for The 42nd Pushcart Poetry Prize), Zmiznutia a návraty (Bratislava, 2018, the first contemporary Chinese poet’s book pub¬lished in Slovakia), In a Flash of Lightening: 54 Poems of Cosmic Vision (2022, EXILE Editions, Canada); two poetry books of Tomaž Šalamun (both 400+ pages each): Light-Blue-Pillow Tower (2014), The Enormous Boiling Mouths of the Sun (2016); THE THRESHOLD THE SAND: Complete Po¬ems of Edmond Jabès (one of two translators, 2019), Selected Poems of Tim Lilburn (2020, win “Translation Grant” by Canada Council for the Arts), A Night with Hamlet by Vladimir Holan(2022), Crow, Season Songs by Ted Hughes (in forthcoming, 2023), and selected works by others: Hart Crane (US), Yannis Ritsos(Greece), Harold Bloom(US), et al. Some of her poems have been translated into 16 languages and published worldwide. She is a frequent guest in different poetry festivals held in Europe and Asia, among which she would like to mention well known The 28th Vilenica Internation¬al Literature Festival and being judge of Crystal Vilenica Prize of that year. She works for Poetry Periodical, the top poetry magazine in China and was the Executive Editor-in-Chief of the prestigious poetry translation series Contemporary International Poetry. She was awarded Polish Marii Konop¬nickiej Poetry Prize in 2012, Jerzego Sulimy-Kaminskiego Literature Medal in 2020. Being an Orion Visiting Artist in University of Victoria, Canada in 2017-2018, Resident Poet in Banff Center for Arts and Creativity in 2020 (the project cancelled due to COVID-19). From 2017, she is the Vice-President of European Medal of Poetry and Art-HOMER. She establishes and is the chief editor of “Homer Medal Laureates Series” from 2020. She lives in Beijing.


赵四，诗人、译者、诗学学者、编辑。文学博士（中国社会科学院）、博士后。在海内外出版有十余种著、译作，包括诗集《白乌鸦》《消失，记忆》，英语诗集《在一道闪电中》、斯洛伐克语诗集《出离与返归》等；译著包括萨拉蒙大型诗选《蓝光枕之塔》《太阳沸腾的众口》《门槛·沙：雅贝斯诗全集》《利尔本诗选》， 霍朗《与哈姆雷特之夜》，特德·休斯《乌鸦》《季节之歌》（即出，2023 年）等；另有诗学文章《试论西方现代诗歌本质要素之革命性演变》《译可译，非常译》《俄耳甫斯主义诗人》等。曾获波兰玛利亚·科诺普尼茨卡诗歌奖（2012 年）、杰里·苏利马- 卡明斯基文学奖章（2020 年）。目前在《诗刊》供职。任“欧洲诗歌暨文艺荷马奖章”副主席，主编“荷马奖章桂冠诗人译丛”。