reading late at night
i set aside my copy of laozi’s dào dé jīng,
as if i have tossed away the auspicious and regrettable
outcomes in lifeto meet face to face within this room.
so distant from when the buddha held up a flower quietly
and mahākāśyapa smiled back in silent understanding,
there’s the fish and the water they swim in,
the cat that doesn’t catch fish,
then i recall the small rat that strode across the rug last new year’s eve,
the night peddler’s hawking has also become the universe’s language,
then i remember another line of poetry by a youth
the fish is actually the water in full bloom.
the lantern light seems to have written a poem;
they feel lonesome since i won’t read them.
i say with a grin, i revere your brightness.
my lantern then replies, listen
the night watch is striking a bamboo cylinder to mark time.
Excerpted from The Lantern and the Night Moths: Five Modern and Contemporary Chinese Poets (Invisible Publishing), selected and translated by Yilin Wang.
lantern by Yilin Wang | Sandalwood Poetry Reed Diffuser Set
Yilin Wang (she/they) is a Chinese diaspora poet and Chinese-English translator. Her debut book The Lantern and the Night Moths (Invisible Publishing, 2024) is the first book of translations from Chinese (Mandarin) to win the John Glassco Translation Prize from the Literary Translators Association of Canada in the 40-year history of the prize. Her words and translations have appeared in Clarkesworld, Fantasy Magazine, Room, Canthius, Words Without Borders, The Tyee, the anthology The Way Spring Arrives and Other Stories (TorDotCom 2022), and elsewhere. She has won the Foster Poetry Prize, the ALTA Virtual Fellowship, and the Dwarf Stars Award, and has been a finalist for Canada’s National Magazine Award, the CBC Poetry Prize, and the Aurora Award. www.yilinwang.com
Fei Ming 废名 (1901–1967) was an influential modern Chinese poet, short story writer, novelist, and essayist, and a member of the Yǔ Sī Sè 语丝社, a literary group founded by Lu Xun 鲁迅 and Zhou Zuoren 周作人. He was the author of various poetry books, short story collections, and novels, including Mirror《镜》, The Stories of the Bamboo Grove《竹林的故事》, and Bridge《桥》. Fei Ming’s work was deeply influenced by Buddhism, Daoism, and different schools of Chinese philosophy.
