We spend winter in a silent room where the past’s changed images swing. For three years, you’ve stopped looking back, but doubts still follow your blood. For three years, the joy in books arouses hate for the days. In our eyes like a theater’s final light, we’re abandoned in this silent room. While life has the illusion of winter and the terror of these walls hide sobs, we no longer beckon the flames of words.
The cold air is fresh, and time’s illusions show in snowflake-silent statues: clean playground, too thin winter days. We spend the season among the squeaks of mice. Silent, we let the tired winter light into a corner of our room—sleeping lovers.
The cloudy sky stares at me: nowhere to escape, nature’s quiet light sliding down the raindrops. Phantoms tease my eyes while wind ruffles some towels that hang in front of a hair salon and the girls joke and play, as if on a painted summer canvas. For a heroic temperament, reality is a thorn. Same feast at its messy end, same soft silk and its flamboyant allure, but no one appears weary—how strange. The floor-to-ceiling window disperses city sounds, the unreal fountain hangs its head, and the setting sun has only existed to soothe the emptiness. Let's get going then: partying is a shame, like limbs tangled under a quilt, quietly indulging. Love—turns a blind eye, as the sky’s light hides everything. Spiritual grace isn’t practical after all— why not put your hand on my arm.
Ling Yue / 凌越 is a contemporary Chinese poet, literary critic, and translator. He has published two books of poetry, Songs of the Dust World (Shanghai Literature and Art Publishing House, 2012) and Floating Address (Beijing United Publishing Company, 2021), five collections of criticism, as well as seven volumes of poetry translations. A winner of the prestigious Liu Li’an Poetry Award, he teaches sociology and political science at Guangdong Police College in Guangzhou, China.
Ye Chun / 叶春 is a bilingual Chinese American writer and literary translator. Her novel, Straw Dogs of the Universe, was longlisted for the 2024 Andrew Carnegie Medal for Excellence in Fiction and was named aWashington Post’s Notable Work of Fiction of 2023. She has also published a collection of stories, Hao; two books of poetry, Travel over Water and Lantern Puzzle; a novel in Chinese; and four volumes of translations. A recipient of an NEA Fellowship and three Pushcart Prizes, she is an associate professor at Providence College and lives in Providence, Rhode Island.
