Clouds Poem by Yang Lian

Their time is it also like a big blob of sticky blood Their music stands hide the sky blue performers Lento and allegretto scour a veranda Bearing down upon the valley the sound of wind fills the theatre And the stage crowds with people rushing home Homeless their loneliness fingers a glass eyeball Their heads have all flown from desolate white spines Imaginary boatman dreams of cliffs alarmingly close It is a room flowers on the rented wardrobe chaotically fade At lunch wearing the island's velocity they see Animals on plates jumping from one side to another To be cut up seems to be misunderstood for having been present They use different plays to change dialect And blood and flesh butterfly wings on the menu are eaten Windows darken another border is stealthily crossed So borrow an address to heighten the anxiety in a letter The person who forgets to post it keeps altering the water's surface Theatricality reduces the world To images barely daring to inhale and can be erased at will They transcend their own distance roll up the curtains Draw close to the secret part of life