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  • Cold View, and: Planting
  • Qiu Huadong (bio)
    Translated by Tony Barnstone (bio) and Henry Zhang (bio)

cold view

I walk to the wildsAll emotion is instantly frozenFive flickering crowsSuddenly flash in my eyesI am now lostAt a loss

Better I turn around and goback, walk back,from the crows, awayfrom the vastness over earthen tombs

planting

I want to root roses in your shoessprout violets from your ears

I am running through a sky of big snowSnow drops on my body, light as daylight

From pieces I piece together your gentle wordsat times worrying at strange calligraphy

My words burst into your phrases and linesMy midnight blurs into your hair

I plant violets in your shoesand roses sprout from your lips [End Page 91]

Qiu Huadong

Qiu Huadong 邱华栋 was born in Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region, in northwest China, in 1969. His books include The Starlight in Hands (2016) and Gold Fantasy (2017). He is the associate director of the Lu Xun Literary Institute in Beijing and the associate editor-in-chief of People's Literature magazine.

Tony Barnstone

Tony Barnstone is a professor of English and environmental studies at Whittier College. A prolific poet, author, essayist, and literary translator, he is the author of twenty books. His latest poetry book is Pulp Sonnets (2015). His books of co-translation include Mother Is a Bird: Sonnets by a Yi Poet (2017), River Merchant's Wife by Ming Di (2012), Chinese Erotic Poems (2007), The Anchor Book of Chinese Poetry (2005), and Out of the Howling Storm: The New Chinese Poetry (1993). Among his honors are fellowships from the NEA, the NEH, and the California Arts Council. He has won the Grand Prize of the Strokestown International Poetry Festival, the Pushcart Prize, the Pablo Neruda Prize, and the John Ciardi Prize.

Henry Zhang

Henry Zhang 张晴 grew up in the U.S. and is a graduate student in the Department of Chinese Literature at Beijing Normal University. He participated in several international translation workshops at Beijing Normal University and is a recipient of the 2017 Henry Luce Translation Fellowship in the U.S.

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