By Mu Dan
Translated by Hiedano Ajuu
Green flames flicker across the grass,
As if longing to embrace the flowers.
Flowers stretch upward, against the earth.
When warm wind stirs both joy and fret,
You wake and fling the windows open to the air.
The garden brims with desires, all uncannily fair.
In their twenties, bodies tremble before unending riddles,
As if birdsongs rise from the earth.
You are ignited, yet belong nowhere.
Ah — the light, the shadow, the voice, the colors — all laid bare,
They ache, awaiting a new communion.
Mu Dan was a thoughtful man, fully aware of his identity as a modern intellectual. He pondered deeply on life, probing the joy and pain inside the soul. Yet he could condense his reflections into a few lines, achieving remarkable expressive power.
— Excerpt from Du Yunxie, Recalling Mu Dan, translated by Hiedano Ajuu.
