South of the Clouds: The China Suite

Image from Christie's

4. South of the Clouds*

Between Kunming and Dali

On Chuda Highway,

I catch a glimpse of China

Writing her destiny

Like the strokes of elegant calligraphy.

Tar and concrete

Lined with aluminum,

Under the whine of rubber,

The highway wipes itself

Into the countryside,

Turning and twisting

Across slopes of pine and eucalyptus,

Leaping over rivers,

Spinning into gullies,

Racing and twining with the railroad,

Edging and cutting into mountains,

Washing and smearing into the mist,

Vanishing into the clouds.

Past hamlets of mud and brick houses,

Endless croplands and mounds

Of harvest and hay

Baking under the Yunnan sun,

It sweeps me into the smoke and dust

Of sudden cities,

Bai maidens dancing a lost culture,

The imperial feasts of twelve-course lauriats,

The heady toasts of mao taiand brandy,

The tinkle of porcelain in the serving of tea,

The hurried departures

For the next encounter with history.

Between Kunming and Dali,

In China’s vast hinterland

South of the Clouds,

I am cast outside the realm of words

Where landscape is the only language.

And I am tempted

By this anonymity and smallness

Of tourists and exiles:

The mind, seduced, hurtles

Into the borderless cavern of distance,

Where I become a mere echo of myself,

Bouncing off the stare of strangers,

Smiling and bowing my thanks

For a handful of souvenirs,

The grace of precious memory.

January 17, 2001

*Literal translation of ‘Yunnan’

Into squares and monuments

Caught in the grappling

And shedding of centuries,

Into the utter strangeness

Of courtyards and old quarters struggling

Against the new scripts of modernity:

5. East of the Clouds: Chu Yuan at T’ung Ting Lake

(In Memory of Ma Ning-ning)

In the Dragon Boat Festival on the fifth day of the fifth moon, to commemorate

the tragic suicide of Chu Yuan, the people sail boats with lighted candles

into the river. They throw ma’chang(rice and pork delicacy wrapped in leaves)

into the water so the crocodiles would eat them instead of their beloved poet.

By blood and imperial fiat

I found myself where few poets

Ever dream of wanting to be:

Exalted in the Emperor’s court,

Prime Minister of an expanding Ch’i.

In robes of resplendent silk,

In wafts of spice and cinnamon wine I walked.

Breath of sandalwood, harmonies

Of zither and lyre, whisper of gong and tinkle

Of castanets followed me.

But the drums throbbed

And the gongs beat no longer in celebration.

Instead they announced the fate I knew:

Unable to let my verses sing

The carnage of helpless peasant and hapless serf,

The imperial sword and cannon

Gouging out ricefield and orchard

In the quest for new borders,

I left the abode and sight of my heedless Lord,

Banished and resented, condemned to be distant.

East of the clouds I flew

Like a listless swallow and settled

On the shores of T’ung Ting,

And the Lord of the Lake smiled on me:

In wind among lotus and magnolia he spoke to me—

Take heed of the people’s stories.

Breathe the life of their words and weave it

Into your calligraphy. Seek the munificent gods

Of their legends and let them sing in your verses,

For that is the comfort of your fate: your only faith.

Among orchids I dwell, my gaze sweeps garlands

Of lilacs and azaleas. Walking with the divine,

It is a time unknown and unforgettable. The willows bend

And the lake is a pool in the Palace of the Moon.

I am drunk with happiness but my grief refuses to go.

My spirit wanders over the face of the deep.

The swift-flowing freshets of the Milu River

Swirl into eddies. Under a gate of purple-shell,

Into the hall of dragons, into the palace of pearls, I go.

Multitudes of tortoise and golden carp escort me.

March 26, 2002

Poetry&Stuffby

MARNE KILATES

MARNE