Poetry

Two Poems

by Wawa

translated by Henry Wei Leung

A photograph of a white kite held by an arm that stretches into the bottom of the frame with the moon hovering just above the kite — **Prelapsarian Bloom: One Day One Life**, thread on kite, LED light. Photo courtesy of the author.

[untitled]

a day a life, between death and birth,
under the moon, two shadows, flung to wilderness,
merge, moonwane, glimmering receptacle-world,
in veil or in view, wherever wind goes not, a shadow’s cast,
wending apace, ether and vale, wending apace,
imprints and shadows, wending apace,
bloom-open bloom-fall,
a shallow pond saves the moon, severed river,
unforsaking mountain, mind delivered to sky’s edge,
looking down,
mortal coil

[untitled]

pace at heaven’s ledge : dwarf star falling :
a one-sun distance : muse muse can’t let go :
fire gathering : myriad world : from far afield ask : whence :
gaze upon the earth : one leaf drops :
no buttress : no rest :
wind wends the bamboo grove : powder of rain :
dissolving earth and yonder :
fog cover : mortal coil : a flame left to its own fuel :
haze of tree shades : one touch and it passes :
eyes closed : the fumes disperse : hair gone white :
mountains rivers mother earth :
shaken as from a dream

Translations from the Chinese

Editorial note: From the manuscript Prelapsarian Bloom.

Wawa, aka Lo Mei Wa (lomeiwa.com), is a Hong Kong medium-pure poet. She received her degrees in philosophy in Hong Kong and the Netherlands and is the author of Pei Pei the Monkey King and Anna and Anna. She is currently living in Berkeley.