The Septinity of a Eulogy □ 杨政《七哀》#百科诗派英文联展#

(Photo taken in 1990, in Fuzhou)

Bio

Yang Zheng is a contemporary poet and publisher of Jiangsu origin, who was born in Shanghai in 1968. He entered Chinese Department of Sichuan University in 1985. 

He is the founder of the renowned experimental literary magazine Dynastry ("Wang Chao") and co-founder of Pseudomorph ("Xiang Wang"), which were both among the most influential literary magazines in the 1980s .

The Septinity of a Eulogy

by Yang Zheng

During the scorching summer of 1989, I secluded myself from the perplexing world in solitude in Fujian Province, southeast of China,

When the anticlimax of autumn faded in, standing in front of misty draperies of the sea, a sense of fathomless sorrow started churning within me.

I paid occasional visits to sites where ancient sages once resided, and wrote this eulogy as a tribute to those dim figures realms apart.

Shui Tou

Tonight, it unfurled its dense, dewy quilt

For me to nestle against, where on a glimmer

unfolded the annual-rings carved on my palms. Shui Tou

with its lounging sore body, provided me with the symbol of a final destination. The bay,

smoothly encircled by the East Sea, in the shape of a shallow navel

without any trace of the moon or the stars, closed its eyes with a foreboding of transmigration

Shui Tou, you were like my head innocently rising above the surface of impermanence

combed sleek by the monsoon,

listening to the mournful weeps from beneath the depth of the continental shelf

It just flitted by! Rousing my ebony hair in the wind

Whilst I stood side by side with the nightfall and gazed away

into the ivory glow emerging from whisking skirt-hems of darkness

I had a handful of the smell of decay, my beloved East Sea,

but how could I dry you up by just taking a mouthful

of the broth from you pot, and how could you save me from descending to companion of aquatic creatures?

Note: 

1. Shui Tou is a small town in Nan’an, Fujian Province, located by the East Sea

2. Qi Ai(The Septinity of a Eulogy) is a pattern of rhyme called ‘Music Conservatory’ which dates back to late Han Dynasty. ‘Seven’ here is an approximate number,which refers to a profusion of sorrow.

Vast Bodies of Water

Vast bodies of water, rose high above from the western sky,

where the billowing tongue of legendary Kunlun Mountain

licked by East Sea, became a conveyer belt of desolation

How the ranges stood in loftiness! A hazy lunar halo that the White Tiger Constellation exhaled

has scorched the sleepless Kunlun Mountain tonight,  underneath which

I held a dim paradise in my hands

What futility we have expected from reminiscence！A wisp of smoke

swirling, subsiding into a shade deep in my irises. In retrospect, no silhoutte of the ancient moon could be seen

the deceased, who puffed up the stomach of the sea

and made it shine like the belly of a fish, the all-devouring torrents of mud and sand, veiled the truth that human flesh and bones could be reborn as giant turtles

O the tumbling waves, simmering underneath the eastern sky! I am your Therion, hustling around the world, wearing my heart on my sleeves. Tell me where to find your titanic grey head, lordly raised?

The Gale

The Gale dived into the solemn gown of the sea, with its head resting on the crest of waves,

Its withering smell lingering on the edge of tonight, was a bait for languid aquatic eyes 

Ephemeral paradise for white breakers heaping up

Where I roamed and hovered about, in all dithering dreariness stored up during this life

The Gale, named “Huan Tou” by our ancestors, a beast 

Agile and adventurous, rising from bosom of the sea

In masquerade of a blank Mongolian face  

Predestinated to drift afar, to the other side

Balmy and merciful, O Huan Tou

Your features were sallow and lugubrious, your forehead

reflecting an antique luster frenetic and sinister. You were exiled

Yet struggling for a unpromising hereafter, ploughing the ocean

Your indorsed life was there in the steaming pot

While Fortuna boils her broth within!

Note: 

According to the Atlas of Hills and Seas, Huan Tou was a beast with human face, a beak and two wings, who ate fish of the sea, and walked with its wings as crutches.

Alas!

Alas! The southeast land of milk and honey, exposed

Its scalp infested with weed, among where 

the dignitaries of past dynasties rested in peace

The boundless mighty waters were torn apart, and the bottom of the pot

was unveiled, 

Where tumultuous vapor steamed for you

precious golden sheaves, which would quench your hunger

My mountain nymph, I was seeking for your resplendent mortal frame

longing to revive the star-strewn vault of heaven with your lips

and to imprint my expression of vacancy on your young and savage chest

Nothing but vanity! How the chaff raised by winds

Concealed your fantastic waist line! How the hooves of antelopes

served as a foil to your rambling mind?

O mountain nymph, I was eager to be one of your plumes

stretching eastward, over the Ta-pa Mountains, marvelous rivers, or even beyond Kuimen Gate of Qutang Gorge,

Just to sprinkle your tears over the sea!

 (1989-1991)

(Tr: Yin Xiaoyuan)

附原文：

七哀

文/杨政

己巳年（1989）酷暑，余远避东南，蛰于闽南海滨，及秋日，悲风起于心底，观沧海而思蜀地，遂访先贤制《七哀》之曲，斯人斯土，生死契阔。

●水头

今夜，抖开它厚重的湿被窝

我来入眠，一缕幽光映现

手掌上的岁月，浑身酸涩的

水头*，已是我的末途了，海湾

圆圆，宛如东海一只浅显的肚脐

星月俱无，闭上今生今世的眼

水头，你是我探出海面的懵懂的

脑勺，被季风梳理得光光，还在

费力聆听来自内陆低处的哀哭

已迅疾掠过！惊起几绺乌发

并立遥望黑夜高高飘拂的裙裾

透出此刻的白皙，我摊开双手

双手都是腐朽，东海，可是

谁能有一张足够的嘴来喝干

你锅中的汤汁，使我免为鱼鳖？

注：

* 水头：地名，在福建南安。

●大水 

大水汤汤，出于西天，昆仑

东海欲吮吸你翻搅不定的

长舌，送来那隔夜的荒凉

峰峦耸峙，白虎吞吐的月晕

烘炙着今夕不眠的昆仑，双手

捧出一座神思恍惚的天堂，我的

碌碌前缘！早化作一抹烟霭

却升腾于今夕，成为我眼眸间

唯一的阴翳，回头望不见古月

夭者，借一段鱼腹吹胀了东海

滞涩的胃囊，泥沙俱下，今生

为人，呜呼，转世当作龟

大水汩汩，踯躅东方，昆仑

我是你奔走的牛马，肝胆摧绝

何处是你卓立的千年皓首？  

●那风

那风，钻入东海腥腻的青衿  

头枕着白浪高高，放眼皆是

今夜的枯涩，引来惺忪的鳖眼

乜斜浪花堆砌的瞬息天堂

轻轻，游弋于此生的哈欠与踌躇

那风，吾祖叫你欢头*，一只

快捷的探险禽兽，恰从东海的

乳间升起它茫然的蒙古人面

命定流窜远方，去找寻悲悯的

彼岸，犹带一脸颓废的腊黄

欢头，你是吾祖狂热且不祥的

前额，离乡背井，只为了

碰撞眉头紧拧的来世，出没于

骇浪惊涛，年年，锅鼎苦闷

汤汁蒸腾，你被承诺的全部人生！

注：

*见《山海经·大荒南经》：“欢头，人面鸟喙，有翼，食海中鱼，杖翼而行”。

●噫吁

噫吁，巨腕高擎起西南，不见

它那苍凉的头皮，上面

有我衮衮诸公，皆尽长卧安息

大水分崩逃逸，敞开中央的

锅底，烟霭蒸蒸，烹制出

一束灿烂五谷，喂你咕咕肠胃

山鬼，我欲追觅你斑斓的肉身

借你的唇复活今夜的苍穹，我欲

往你幼兽般的前襟烙下一片茫然

空虚！可是那粒稻壳遮掩了你

梦起伏的腰腹？哪阵羚羊蹄碎

是你鹄然的心神正踊跃飞驰？

山鬼，我若是你向东升起的一根

羽翎，越巴山，涉大江，度夔门

只为代替你向大海挥洒一滴清泪！

（殷晓媛 译）

延伸阅读：一只“苍蝇”与59部电影的跨时空交错｜读杨政诗集《苍蝇》