Exhaling Mist Poem by Xiao Kaiyu

A mountain top? A house? A person?

please don't breathe out again

please don't put today to sleep

please don't force it out, don't

please don't open your mouth

please don't believe in the buoyancy of air


and let down a first well-meaning desire

let down a hand held out

a dazzling face

an intoxicating waist

a morning light kept secret too long

a silently burning scruple


My damp body has already reached noon

my lukewarm heart is already in middle years

I watch the mist scatter into a feeble sunlight

I pass through a thicket of statues

open a book from which almost all type-face has fled

encourage a very small dream