China NCPA Orchestra 2019

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A: All things cannot bear contact with liquid. When they meet water, they rot. I truly long to surrender myself to water, to let it erode me. I do not recoil from the stench of decay. Rebirth fills me with unbearable revulsion. Life reeks like a pig‑sty. Do not hold me back. I want to embrace the liquid. I want to rot.

B: How I wish I were deaf, my ears reduced to useless ornaments. You have died a thousand magnificent deaths. No one has forced you to hold back. That liquid lies vivid right before your eyes; you could die at any moment. Yet you keep living, up to this day. Let me help you step into it. Your body will swell, you will float adrift, and in time rot away into nothingness. I shall stand alone, watching wisps of your being drift away. I shall grieve not, for you have chosen death, your long‑cherished wish, the sorrow life has taught you.

A: Do not forget to greet the lofty mountains of the south. Green grass will stretch and drift beneath your feet. Think also of the birds, and of me. Prepare to depart. Gentle breezes nod as we pay homage to the mountains, unchanged through millennia. In the frozen north, rivers lie fully solidified. For a hundred miles all is white, yet the colour of those rivers lingers indelible in my memory. O surging river, you are the spirit of my thoughts. Azure and fluor‑green make up our minds; undercurrents surge, shifting back and forth like the flood of our thoughts, like your life and mine, like the eternity of all beings. Today I have laid the mountains down, even as I lay down the frozen rivers of the north. Azure and fluor‑green will fade, the undercurrents will cease to flow. Greet them on my behalf.

B: Go then. Walk straight onward. The great flood lies ahead. It is not what you imagine. It will carry you into eternity. You may fear. You may regret. Let me fasten a rope around your neck, strong and secure. I will not abandon you. If remorse overcomes you, send your signal through the rope, and I may pull you back to life. Let me loop it gently around your throat, so it shall not strangle you.

A: No, no rope. My resolve is unshaken. I have seen all there is to see. No illusions remain. Our evils are not so terrible, nor our beauties so splendid. Nothing in all creation is worth clinging to. All shall pass away. I shall step unwavering into the flood before me — the true flood of our minds, into our genuine past.

B: Have I gone blind? Why can I no longer see light? Where have you gone? The flood has dissolved into illusion. I cannot tell which way to turn. My heart is in turmoil. How can I keep my promise? My eyes are as those of a blind man. What was that sound? Was it the splash of you leaping into the flood? That plunge snuffed out my light. I can only pray the frozen age will not return, for without frost there can be no hope of spring. The earth melts into the river. Grass is swallowed. At last the mountains crumble before my eyes. The colourful world bleeds into dull grey. The world vanishes. Light has taken everything away. Darkness descends. I have lost my sight entirely.

A Wall

I have met a wall.

It has done me no harm,

yet I cannot climb over it.

Its high top is out of sight.

No one can turn away,

for beyond this wall there is nothing else.

Life blooms because of it.

For this wall alone,

some bear lacerated wounds,

while I remain unharmed.

Knowing my fate,

knowing I cannot cross,

still I press onward, striving to surmount it.

Within orderly bewilderment,

there stands a wall before me.

Slanting Sun

There is a shadow,

unlike all other shadows.

Golden strands of hair,

through which sunlight turns to burnished gold.

I cannot read your melancholy,

yet longing shines in your gaze.

I love those golden hairs.

They glow with warmth in the slanting sun,

warming my heart more and more.

Beneath the sun lie lingering snows,

yet those golden hairs breathe forth warmth.

Your breath hangs heavy.

Within your pupils rings a golden hue,

glinting gold under the sinking sun.

Though the north wind cuts sharp,

though your clothes are thin,

the warmth of the slanting sun cannot reach everywhere.

In this cold world,

time slips away,

yet your upturned lips still hold warmth.

Cold Rain

Mud underfoot,

water everywhere.

Life is drained by rain.

Rotten stench ferments across the earth.

This darkness holds no reason.

Suddenly I think of pink —

pink, the colour of life.

I tramp through mire, step after step.

I cannot hope for light.

Hopeless darkness fades along with the cold rain.

Grant me a cup of hot water,

let me forget the icy past.

Mist

Vast haze fills all sight.

Nothing is clear.

Though I know light waits not far off,

now I dwell within mist,

blanketing the earth in blurred confusion.

Magnolia blossoms lie fallen,

their petals pale and indistinct, corpses on the ground.

All things are dying.

Obscurity is the natural state.

Do not hope for flowers to bloom.

Perhaps the mist will lift.

Yet blur and vast haze are life coming into being.

O Mist.

All That Can Be Seen

I have seen everything plainly.

Nothing remains hidden.

What I can bear and what I cannot bear,

all lies bare before my eyes.

A pot holds human flesh, still uncooked.

Spices drift through the air, beguiling.

Nearby on the gallows hang gnawed‑clean bones.

Whose body is this?

Neither you nor I know.

This is cruelty without precedent,

yet we can scarcely bring ourselves to acknowledge it.

Dry winds howl across the wilderness.

Scaffolds crash silently to the ground,

only to be solemnly raised again,

for one single purpose:

to cut the dried remains of the dead.

These trunks that once bore flowers and leaves

are soaked through with blood.

Do you still remember that love was born of the wilderness?

Do you still remember the oaths sworn beneath tree‑shade?

I know those were all illusions,

like corpses swaying in the dry wind.

The earth exhales no life‑giving breath.

Funeral bells ring within my soul,

not struck by metal.

What I behold is the whole of this world,

its complete truth.

We yearn no more,

not even for rebirth.

The Earth Trembles

A low roar comes from far away,

not thunder from the heavens.

I know well the crack of lightning.

This roar feels as though it comes from my homeland,

where dewdrops once wet my wings,

and white clouds nurtured me.

Today’s rumbling rises deep beneath the earth.

Every blade of grass shudders.

Dewdrops splash outward in all directions.

It is the earth trembling,

forever gestating life and destiny.

Run, all living things.

Let dew nourish every corner of the world.

Run upon the earth,

driven the same way as scattering dewdrops.

Someone is running!

For whom does the earth tremble?

Sun for All Beings

You are truly irreplaceable.

Not only in my eyes.

Even the modest self within me

knows it cannot replace you.

No creature would cast you aside,

save to bring shame upon itself.

This is far more than life‑and‑death,

nor merely the fantasy that all is mind‑made.

You are a kind of virtual eternity,

shining upon my heart for ages.

Because you exist, evil is fleeting.

Because you exist, darkness cannot last forever.

You are truly irreplaceable.

Such is the loveliness of all existence.