A Sound Poem by Jiang Haizhou

I hear a sound of someone exclaiming—
so familiar, but not déjà vu.
The one is not you but a customer
lodging in an inn next door. I don't know that person.
Right now, you are just far away: doing business,
or doing nothing. Maybe, one day
you will suddenly appear: I'm taking a nap,
or already drunk late at night. Maybe I will
get to your place, to the entrance of the station,
which I'm not so familiar with,
I can hear you calling there. You have been also
calling me in your dream. But now
it's not a dream: it's in the afternoon——
I am reading gloomy-son's poetry now.: it's already not
so important to know who has made the sound: at least,
it's not twittering over locust trees out of the window,
nor mosquitoes' moan. It is a person's calling——
which I am familiar with. That is all enough.

June 3,2008