From Ghosts City Sea by Wang Yin, translated by Andrea Lingenfelter

Now

you drive off with your two children, away
from the springtime ward, while I lie in bed
peering through smog for a glimpse of garden flowers 
all I see is a field of purple roseola
there, innocent spiders
live and die in silence, happy as can be
a frail young woman sets an empty water glass
on the lawn
the glass bends the green blades beneath it
like past events you don’t remember
until someone mentions them, like bullets
piercing the body of a gazelle
May, almost upon us
still deep in the fishbowl
dreaming of rain-soaked
sugarcane far from the capital

2015

现在

你开车把两个孩子带离了
春天病房，卧榻上的我试图
透过雾霾去看花园
却看到一场紫色的天花

在那里，天真的蜘蛛
生生死死，默默无闻，欢爱不息
衰弱的妹妹将着空了的水杯
放在草地上

杯子压弯青草
就像那些往事需要有人提起
才能忆及子弹如何
洞穿羚羊的身体

即将到来的五月
兀自在鱼缸深处
梦见雨中那些
远离首都的甘蔗

2015