Chill

[rejectomorph]

It's cold again, but tonight the sky is draped with scattered veils if silky cloud which occasionally drift across the gibbous moon and carry off some of its light. A while ago a dog on the next street found it necessary to howl for a few minutes. I have no idea what set him off, but he added a melancholy note to the night, and his subsequent silence made me suddenly aware of the empty fields and tattered woods, and the river flowing in its canyon. I wouldn't want to be a deer tonight.



Sunday Verse

To the Tune of "A Phoenix Hairpin"

by T'ang Wan


The world's love runs thin.
Human love turns evil.
Rain strips, in the yellow twilight,
the flowers from the branches.

The dawn wind will dry my tear stains.
I try to write down the trouble of my heart.
I can only speak obliquely, exhausted.
It is hard, hard.
We are each of us all alone.

Today is not yesterday.
My troubled mind sways
like the rope of a swing.
A horn sounds in the cold depth of the night.

Afraid of people's questions
I will swallow my tears
and pretend to be happy.
Deceit. Deceit. Deceit.