Spacetime
Time is like a shadow cast on the road
時間如影在路
英文的思念叫長
我長—長——的想妳
時間如影在路
英文的思念叫長
我長—長——的想妳
垂下兩隻袖兩隻褲腳伸長手指腳指伸長
每一條頭髮與眉毛
拖在地上如根
一隻黑鳥飛過
細細的影子在樹
葉子散落一地
中文的寂寞叫空
一張白白的稿紙
「喂，再來情詩三首！」
半透明沒一個影子
世界很大而我短短的
坐在這裏 愈坐愈透明
沒有文字可填滿
我四面八方的空
與前前後後的長
Time is like a shadow cast on the road
the English word longing has length in it
I long——long———for you
My sleeves pant legs fingers and toes stretch out
every single hair on my head and brow
stretches downward trailing on the ground like roots
a black bird flies past
casting its slender shadow on the tree
Leaves scatter
The Chinese word for loneliness is emptiness
an empty sheet of lined paper
“hey you, three more love poems!”
translucent it has no shadow
the world is big and for now I am
sitting here growing more transparent
no words can fill up
how empty I am on all sides
and, in front and behind, how long
_____
Yau Ching. “時空” from 大毛蛋 [Big hairy egg]. Hong Kong: Kubrick, 2011.
Born in Hong Kong and educated in Hong Kong, New York, and London, Yau Ching is a poet, filmmaker, and scholar. She has authored more than ten books including The Impossible Home (2000), which won the Hong Kong Biennial Award for Chinese Literature. Her website is www.yauching.com.
Chenxin Jiang (she/her) translates from Italian, German, and Chinese. Her most recent translation is for now I am sitting here growing transparent by Yau Ching for Zephyr Press. Other books include the PEN/Heim-winning The Cowshed by Ji Xianlin for New York Review Books and Tears of Salt by Pietro Bartolo and Lidia Tilotta for MacLehose and Norton, shortlisted for the Italian Prose in Translation Award. Chenxin grew up in Hong Kong and is now based in Denver; she serves as president of the board for the American Literary Translators Association.
