Courtyard.
The Statue of Feeling A tree stump planted in dreams has never seen a sparrow's perch It chirps like a solitary finger Snow wraps its wooly shawl around the courtyard warmed and dripping with mystery The roof ridge turns red in the fiery stove of the fading sun Tree shadows turn putrid, memory's dove-feathers flutter then settle into time a wine jug hollow and deep Fallen leaves rustle on vague palm-lines A lamp goes out solitude 1991
Huang Xiang was born in Hunan Province, China, in 1941. He began writing poetry in the 1950s and has been imprisoned repeatedly for his work. In 1978 he founded "Enlightenment," the first underground writers' society, and started a literary magazine under the same name. In exile in the United States since 1997, he has been a resident poet in Pittsburgh under the PEN Cities of Asylum program for writers and currently lives in New Jersey with his wife and son. Huang's Out of Communist China, a bilingual anthology, was published in 2003, and a new selection of his poems, A Lifetime Is a Promise to Keep, will be published in spring 2008. As a juror for the 2008 Neustadt International Prize for Literature, he nominated Tibetan writer Tsering Woeser for the award.
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| Title Annotation: | poetry |
|---|---|
| Author: | Xiang, Huang |
| Publication: | World Literature Today |
| Article Type: | Poem |
| Date: | Mar 1, 2008 |
| Words: | 209 |
| Previous Article: | I Believe. |
| Next Article: | Old Hometown. |