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Poem

Song Wei

POEM OF THE BODY

—In mid-spring of the year of wood, I posted myself on the back hill of Red Silk Clouds, meditating. This poem came to me during the meditation.

Tomb-sweeping Day is over, but the body is still feasting.

Internal organs open like a grocery store: welcome guests.

Guests are the wind, master is the air: they interchange.

Liver is the God on duty today, his hangover

finally over. A sudden epiphany in the eye:

eucommia trees and pears are not-trees but medicine and fruit.

To all of these I turn a deaf ear.

I’m not surprised that the organ vessels swept by the airflow

release a dim light.

In between, the lung is so simple. It exhales a crude breath,

and gets self-refreshed repeatedly.

Let the dust settle at the tailbone. Leaves emit a

clapping sound, an echo of their hunger?

Are there hungry intestines hiding in my bulging belly?

Are my hungry intestines carrying waste matter?

Look, it’s more than a fart. My pee and golden shit

are food resurrected (they left me and found their way out.)

Stomach is yellow earth shaped into a device

but empty: between the holes, gods of the internal organs

are leaving one by one. In this sparse interior,

even the careful thoughts, or seasonal ideas,

are nothing but small confusions, at most the internal drafts

of a poem. So a bird lands on my head to shit.

The bird thinks I’m transfixed like a wooden chicken,

paying no attention to whatsoever’s beautiful around me.

No lush heart. Even my lusty bladder is at rest.

Not even a threat to myself.

身体之诗

身体之诗

──寅木年仲春,在缙云后山站桩、打坐,冥想中得句



清明已过,但身体仍在过节。
五脏的杂货铺开门迎客,
客人是风,主人是气:他们要风气往来。

肝是今天的值日之神,他的宿醉
终得疏解,开窍于目,看到的
杜仲与梨皆非树木,是药与果实。

对这些,我全都置若罔闻,
并不惊讶于六腑中各种器皿
被这些风气擦拭,散发稀薄的光明。

其间,肺是何其轻简,他
大松一口粗气,被自己一再梳理,
又让尘埃在尾闾落定;而树叶

发出了击掌声,是要与饥肠呼应?
呀,我的鼓腹中莫非还有饥肠在潜伏?
我的饥肠里也能有数不尽的排泄物?

你看,不止是屁。自家水与黄金矢,
全都是食物在往生(它们纷纷弃我而去)。
胃则是一庭黄土,抟身为器,却又
 
空空如也:孔窍之间,诸脏之神
也都一一出离。当此疏离内景,
即使再细密的心思(或再合于时令)

也只是内里的一次小纠结:至多是
一首诗腹稿的书写。于是一只小鸟
来我头上遗矢,在他看来,我呆若木鸡,

对周围所有的美都不置一词,
既无色心,色胆也消歇,
甚至对自己都不构成威胁。


2010-05-03,初记于缙云后山
2010-06-23,重抄于沙坪坝

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POEM OF THE BODY

—In mid-spring of the year of wood, I posted myself on the back hill of Red Silk Clouds, meditating. This poem came to me during the meditation.

Tomb-sweeping Day is over, but the body is still feasting.

Internal organs open like a grocery store: welcome guests.

Guests are the wind, master is the air: they interchange.

Liver is the God on duty today, his hangover

finally over. A sudden epiphany in the eye:

eucommia trees and pears are not-trees but medicine and fruit.

To all of these I turn a deaf ear.

I’m not surprised that the organ vessels swept by the airflow

release a dim light.

In between, the lung is so simple. It exhales a crude breath,

and gets self-refreshed repeatedly.

Let the dust settle at the tailbone. Leaves emit a

clapping sound, an echo of their hunger?

Are there hungry intestines hiding in my bulging belly?

Are my hungry intestines carrying waste matter?

Look, it’s more than a fart. My pee and golden shit

are food resurrected (they left me and found their way out.)

Stomach is yellow earth shaped into a device

but empty: between the holes, gods of the internal organs

are leaving one by one. In this sparse interior,

even the careful thoughts, or seasonal ideas,

are nothing but small confusions, at most the internal drafts

of a poem. So a bird lands on my head to shit.

The bird thinks I’m transfixed like a wooden chicken,

paying no attention to whatsoever’s beautiful around me.

No lush heart. Even my lusty bladder is at rest.

Not even a threat to myself.

POEM OF THE BODY

—In mid-spring of the year of wood, I posted myself on the back hill of Red Silk Clouds, meditating. This poem came to me during the meditation.

Tomb-sweeping Day is over, but the body is still feasting.

Internal organs open like a grocery store: welcome guests.

Guests are the wind, master is the air: they interchange.

Liver is the God on duty today, his hangover

finally over. A sudden epiphany in the eye:

eucommia trees and pears are not-trees but medicine and fruit.

To all of these I turn a deaf ear.

I’m not surprised that the organ vessels swept by the airflow

release a dim light.

In between, the lung is so simple. It exhales a crude breath,

and gets self-refreshed repeatedly.

Let the dust settle at the tailbone. Leaves emit a

clapping sound, an echo of their hunger?

Are there hungry intestines hiding in my bulging belly?

Are my hungry intestines carrying waste matter?

Look, it’s more than a fart. My pee and golden shit

are food resurrected (they left me and found their way out.)

Stomach is yellow earth shaped into a device

but empty: between the holes, gods of the internal organs

are leaving one by one. In this sparse interior,

even the careful thoughts, or seasonal ideas,

are nothing but small confusions, at most the internal drafts

of a poem. So a bird lands on my head to shit.

The bird thinks I’m transfixed like a wooden chicken,

paying no attention to whatsoever’s beautiful around me.

No lush heart. Even my lusty bladder is at rest.

Not even a threat to myself.

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