Ghost walks dog, photography by Janet Lees 珍妮特·丽兹
what do we know of darkness?
我们对黑暗了解多少？
the house hangs on yellow squares, the silhouette of
the stick legs of a silent dog; a person glows in a frame
of glass. Dark so quiet that the blood in your head is loudest.
Darkness ceases all momentum, one swing of the pendulum,
then it is stuck; waiting for the sun to move it back.
6th September 2024
Response Poetry by Helen Pletts 海伦·普莱茨
Response Poetry translated by Ma Yongbo 马永波
我们对黑暗了解多少？
what do we know of darkness?
房子悬在黄色方块上，一只无声的狗
枯枝般细腿的剪影；一个人在玻璃框中
发光。黑暗如此安静，你脑中的血流声最响。
黑暗止息了所有的动量，钟摆只摆了一次，
然后就卡住了；等待太阳再次把它推回原处。
2024年9月6日海伦·普莱茨
What do we know of darkness?
我们对黑暗了解多少？
to Helen Pletts
给海伦·普莱茨
You gently step outside yourself, your breath
like white petals floating in the darkness of the garden.
The aftershock of a distant lawnmower still reverberates,
It seems too late to strip away its romanticism.
The horse rubs against the rough, scaly tree trunk,
seemingly needing no rider.
Yet nothing can truly be lost,
This ancient dualism has taught us kindness.
Your newly painted house, a warm yellow cocoon,
gradually becomes translucent.
Another you is still there, writing poetry, painting,
listening to the slow will of the midnight water drops.
7 September 2024,
Response Poetry by Ma Yongbo 马永波
Response Poetry Translated by Ma Yongbo 马永波
我们对黑暗了解多少？
What do we know of darkness?
给海伦·普莱茨
to Helen Pletts
你轻轻地站到了自己外面，你的呼吸
像白色的花瓣漂浮在花园的黑暗之中
远方一台割草机的余震还在传来
去除它的浪漫主义色彩似乎为时已晚
马在粗糙的带鳞片的树身上摩擦
似乎并不需要一个骑手
可是没有什么能够真正失去
这古老的二元论教会了我们仁慈
你新刷过的房子，一只温暖的黄色的茧
逐渐透亮，另一个你还在那里写诗，刷油漆
倾听午夜水滴那缓慢的意志
2024年9月7日马永波
Janet Lees 珍妮特·丽兹, poet, artist and poetry filmmaker. Janet’s photography is included in the forthcoming bilingual poetry book ‘Night Shining-White’ by Ma Yongbo 马永波 and Helen Pletts 海伦·普莱茨, Edited by Pete Taylor, Open Shutter Press.
is a poet, artist and poetry filmmaker. Her 2019 book ‘House of water’ combines her poetry and art photography, while ‘A bag of sky’ won first prize in the Frosted Fire Firsts pamphlet competition 2019. Her poetry has been widely published in journals and anthologies including Magma, Poetry news, Lighthouse, and The Valley Press Anthology of Prose Poetry. She has won prizes in many different competitions, such as the Bristol Poetry Prize, the Guernsey International Poetry Prize, and The Aesthetica Creative Writing Award, and was the winner of the Poetry News Members’ Poems competition on the theme of ‘Looking Back’, judged by Daljit Nagra.
Janet’s videopoems and art films have been selected for a very wide range of international festivals and screenings, including the ZEBRA Poetry Film Festival and the Aesthetica Art Prize. In 2025 she won Best Poetry Film at the Absurd Art House Film Festival; in 2024 she won first prize in the Filmetry Festival in Michigan and Best International Poetry Short at the Bloomsday Film Festival in Dublin. In 2022 her work featured in the landmark exhibition Poets with a Video Camera: Poetry Film 1980-2020 in Vancouver, and in 2021 she won the Ó Bhéal International Poetry Film Competition. Janet’s award-winning art photography has featured in solo and group shows around the world.
珍妮特·丽兹（个人网站：janetlees.weebly.com）是诗人、艺术家兼诗歌电影创作者。她2019年出版的著作《水之屋》融合了其诗歌作品与艺术摄影；另一部作品《一袋天空》则在2019年“霜火新人小诗集大赛”中斩获一等奖。
她的诗歌作品广泛发表于各类期刊与选集中，包括《岩浆》《诗歌新闻》《灯塔》以及《山谷出版社散文诗选集》。此外，她还在多项赛事中获奖，例如布里斯托尔诗歌奖、根西岛国际诗歌奖、美学创意写作奖，并凭借以“回望”为主题的作品，赢得了由达尔吉特·纳格拉担任评委的“《诗歌新闻》会员诗歌大赛”。
珍妮特的诗歌影像与艺术电影已入选众多国际电影节与展映活动，包括斑马诗歌电影节和美学艺术奖相关展映。2025年，她在荒诞艺术院线电影节中获得“最佳诗电影”奖；2024年，她荣获美国密歇根州电影艺术电影节一等奖，以及爱尔兰都柏林布鲁姆日电影节“最佳国际诗歌短片”奖。2022年，她的作品入选温哥华具有里程碑意义的展览“手持摄像机的诗人：1980-2020年诗歌电影”；2021年，她又斩获奥比尔国际诗歌电影节奖项。此外，珍妮特的艺术摄影曾多次获奖，并在全球多地举办过个人展览与团体展览。
The cover of Poetry Appreciation, first issue, 2025, in which Ma Yongbo’s 马永波 Chinese translation of seven of Helen Pletts’ 海伦·普莱茨 poems and three of Janet Lees 珍妮特·丽兹 poems were published by Changjiang Literature & Art Press in December 2025, ISBN 978-7-5702-4302-0.
POETRY APPRECIATION – CHINESE PUBLICATION OF MA YONGBO’S 马永波 TRANSLATIONS OF SEVEN OF HELEN PLETTS’ 海伦·普莱茨 POEMS AND THREE OF JANET LEES’ 珍妮特·丽兹 POEMS were published in the first issue of Poetry Appreciation in 2025.
Published by Changjiang Literature & Art Press in December 2025,
ISBN 978-7-5702-4302-0.
Chinese Weixin link here: https://mp.weixin.qq.com/s/70JWJLxTAS2_CE6sueAJhQ
海伦·普莱茨（Helen Pletts，1960-），现居剑桥，其作品已被译为中文、孟加拉语、希腊语、越南语、塞尔维亚语、韩语和意大利语。普莱茨的诗歌创作屡获殊荣：五度入围布里德波特诗歌奖（2018、2019、2022-2024），两度入选《里亚尔托》自然与地方诗歌奖长名单（2018、2022），入围银杏生态诗歌奖（2019）、英国国家诗歌大赛（2022），获广场散文诗大赛亚军（2022-23）并再度入围该奖项决选名单（2023-24）。她出版的三部诗集包括与罗米特·伯杰合作的插图诗集《你的眼睛守护着软趾雪花莲》（2022年），在艺术委员会资助下出版的《瓶子银行》（2008年）与《致训诫之鸽》（2009年）。其获奖散文诗收录于《广场奖选集》，生态诗歌见于“打开快门”出版社与“墙头蝇”出版社的选集。作品广泛发表于《国际时报》《民众之声》《墨汗泪》《美学》《奥比斯》《麦基诺》《剑桥诗刊》《沼地芦苇》《湖上诗刊》《城邦》《欧洲诗歌》《诗虚拟》《魔法》《原始传说》《诗界》《理念的圣痕》《菲利克斯领域》等。
the immortalisation of everything
万物的不朽
—for Yongbo
existence is this repeated stillness;
a bright moonbeam still talking to poetry,
white continuously falling has itself perpetuity
the space is suspended in a falling grace.
A green dot of light on a black screen
has the echo of moonbeams, speaking,
the words falling but they stay in the flux of song,
like polished obsidian rocks still conjuring brightness,
stone age daylight shivers in darkness, like a
purring cat, cold in the night, coming back
endlessly viewing itself again in black glass
25th May 2025
“our poems will live in our place, quietly breathing in the depths of time”
Ma Yongbo, 24th May 2025
Response Poetry by Helen Pletts 海伦·普莱茨
Response Poetry Translated by Ma Yongbo 马永波
万物的不朽
the immortalisation of everything
—for Yongbo
存在是这重复的寂静；
一缕明亮的月光仍在与诗歌交谈，
持续飘落的白自有其永恒
空间悬浮于坠落的优雅之中。
黑屏上一个绿色的光点
带着月光的回响，在诉说，
词语飘落却停驻在歌声的流波里，
如打磨过的黑曜石仍在召唤光明，
石器时代的日光在黑暗中颤动，
像一只低吟的猫，寒夜里归来
在黑色玻璃中不断重新打量自身
yellow jasmine summoning the sun in a spring hedge
黄色报春花在春日树篱中召唤着太阳
is yellow jasmine in all her dizziness;
spinning in the dark green leaves.
As she rises his darker leaves stretch beneath her rising colour.
Darkness exists where the shadows are still tumbling
in their winter sticks,
he glimpses her yellow rising neons,
the hot sun suddenly opening her;
matching her blazing
7th April 2025
Response Poetry by Helen Pletts 海伦·普莱茨
Response Poetry Translated by Ma Yongbo 马永波
黄色报春花在春日树篱中召唤着太阳
yellow jasmine summoning the sun in a spring hedge
报春花在一片眩晕中金黄闪耀；
在深绿的叶片间飞旋。
当她把他的黑暗提升
在她愈发浓烈的色彩下延展。
阴影仍在冬日黑暗中翻腾
那里，黑暗依旧存在，
他瞥见她的黄色升起的霓虹，
炽热的太阳突然将她开启；
与她耀眼的光辉相呼应。
raining in darkness
雨在黑暗中下着
the rain is constructing us
forming us from silver and darkness,
our toes standing in silver
under the shorting street light
relentless seconds in on and off,
tonight the visible cloud is a two tiered
stage of darkness with white edges,
opening like a black panther’s mouth swallowing lost light;
the circuitry of the road is momentarily a dazzled green.
Rain has changed our perception of red light too,
and she is still building, she borrows from
shadow and silver to give us shape,
she flexes, only to blur us again, dressing us only in water.
Rain finally decides we are finished,
she gives us white voices of bright mist rising in earnest
1st June 2025 midnight
—on a dry night in Cambridge, just because he sent me a text
earlier tonight from Nanjing saying “raining in darkness”
Response Poetry by Helen Pletts 海伦·普莱茨
Response Poetry Translated by Ma Yongbo 马永波
雨在黑暗中下着
raining in darkness
雨正在构筑我们
用银与黑暗把我们塑造，
我们的脚趾立于银色之中
在不停短路的街灯下
无情的秒针在开关之间跳动，
今夜可见的云是双层的
边缘泛白的黑暗舞台，
如黑豹张口吞噬迷失的光；
道路的电路瞬间化作眩目的绿。
雨也改变了我们对红灯的感知，
而她仍在构建，她借用
阴影与银线赋予我们形状，
她弯曲，却又让我们变得模糊，
只用水为我们更衣打扮。
雨终于认定我们已经成型，
便以真切升滕的明亮薄雾
赋予我们白色的嗓音。
a bird man standing under a tree
一个鸟人站在树下
bird-thought is as optional as shaving.
The critical point at which a bird has thought
is as close as a blade to a whisker on skin,
the beak, slightly askew, as it comes up close,
thought hanging in there, like the whisper
of a thread black leg of a closely gobbled beetle.
The bird man is thinking about shaving.
Bird as a man is thinking about shaving
all the legs off all the beetles.
Thought is the thin leg of everything
and sometimes it does, or does not, come out
of the mouth
27th March 2025
Response Poetry by Helen Pletts 海伦·普莱茨
Response Poetry Translated by Ma Yongbo 马永波
一个鸟人站在树下
a bird man standing under a tree
鸟的思想和刮胡子一样可有可无。
鸟类思考的临界点
就像皮肤上的刀刃和胡须一样接近，
当它靠近时，鸟喙略微倾斜，
思想悬在那里，像一只被紧紧咬着的
甲虫的细线黑腿发出的低语。
鸟人正在考虑刮胡子。
像一个男人，鸟正在考虑
把所有甲虫的腿都剃光。
思想是万物的细腿
有时它会，或不会，
从嘴里说出来
This is the picture by Ma Yongbo 马永波, taken on the 27th March 2025, which inspired Helen Pletts’ 海伦·普莱茨 poem ‘a bird man standing under a tree’. Helen took a similar picture of herself under a tree in Cambridge on the same day and one branch happily appears to grow through both images.
in which I place myself as continuously moving eel
我将自己视为一条不停游动的鳗鱼
when her silver is thinner. I am the silver thread tucking in my fins,
I have forgotten the timelessness of liquid peeling silver in my ears,
destiny drumming on my sides, the urgency of sideways pressure,
the velocity of water scoring rocks over time with clawed feet,
and I am footless, there is no emerging route, I am only in the next
curve, sometimes a silver sickle slicing, for only a moment; a silver dart
25th May 2025
Response Poetry by Helen Pletts 海伦·普莱茨
Response Poetry Translated by Ma Yongbo 马永波
我将自己视为一条不停游动的鳗鱼
in which I place myself as continuously moving eel
当她的银光渐淡，我是藏于鳍间的银线
早已忘却液态银光在耳畔剥落的永恒
命运擂击我的身侧，侧压的急迫感蔓延
水流以利爪随时间在岩石刻下速度
而我无足，亦无浮现的出路，
只存在于下一道弯曲里，
有时是银镰挥斩，不过刹那；一只银矢
the name of water
水之名
in a clear spring, vowels are resting minnows,
light in tiny silver, circling, embellishing.
Each beginning as a small silver embryo.
A pale soft curling, is gradually opening,
straightens a bit and leans against a willow
unspooling her green hair into the brook.
Should we not stretch the poet out any further,
why not leave him resting here
in quiet silver? His floating fins are rippling
pen strokes, here he glances night and day
as one dance. Here he can languish in a muddy berth,
rocked only by the willow’s gentle spiralling wave
26th April 2025
Response Poetry by Helen Pletts 海伦·普莱茨
Response Poetry Translated by Ma Yongbo 马永波
水之名
the name of water
在清冽的泉水中，元音是休憩的鲦鱼，
泛着细碎银辉，游弋盘桓，点缀其间。
每一个开端都如一枚银色的小胚胎。
灰色柔软的蜷曲，正缓缓舒展，
微微挺直，倚着一棵柳树，
将她的绿发垂入溪流中舒展。
我们不应再将诗人拉长，
为何不让他在此处休憩
在静谧的银辉里？他浮动的鳍
是荡漾的笔触，在这里，他日夜顾盼，
如同一支舞蹈。在这里，
他可在软泥的铺位上倦怠慵懒，
唯有柳枝轻柔旋卷的波浪将他摇晃
two soft horses of golden sunlight
两匹柔软的金色阳光之马
together they are blazing in the bright street,
their hooves occasionally meeting in sparks.
Gold re-fashioning their soft forms;
light softly entering and re-entering their shapes.
How does a horse move silently
as a ribbon of stolen light?
What door is left ajar?
Without the dull fixings
they gently spin in softer air?
And every surface of glass shimmers,
clouds are left undefended.
They can neither grey, nor whiten;
the sun is the furnace keeper of two.
20th April 2025
Response Poetry by Helen Pletts 海伦·普莱茨
Response Poetry Translated by Ma Yongbo 马永波
两匹柔软的金色阳光之马
two soft horses of golden sunlight
它们一同在明亮的街道上燃烧，
它们的蹄子偶尔碰撞出火花。
黄金重塑着它们柔软的身形；
温柔的光反复进入它们的轮廓。
一匹马如何无声地移动
像一条偷来的光带？
是什么样的门虚掩着？
没有笨重的羁绊
它们在更柔软的空气中轻轻旋转？
所有玻璃的表面都在闪烁微光，
云朵卸下防备。
它们既不变灰，也不变白；
太阳为它们两个守护着熔炉。
Chinese translations by Ma Yongbo 马永波 of ‘the immortalisation of everything—for Yongbo’ 万物的不朽 and part of ‘yellow jasmine summoning the sun in a spring hedge’ 黄色报春花在春日树篱中召唤着太阳 by Helen Pletts 海伦·普莱茨
Chinese translations by Ma Yongbo 马永波 of the remaining part of ‘yellow jasmine summoning the sun in a spring hedge’ 黄色报春花在春日树篱中召唤着太阳 ‘raining in darkness’ 雨在黑暗中下着 and the opening of ‘a bird man standing under a tree’ 一个鸟人站在树下 by Helen Pletts 海伦·普莱茨
Chinese translations by Ma Yongbo 马永波 of the remaining part of ‘a bird man standing under a tree’ 一个鸟人站在树下, ‘in which I place myself as continuously moving eel’ 我将自己视为一条不停游动的鳗鱼 and the opening of ‘the name of water—for Yongbo’ 水之名 by Helen Pletts 海伦·普莱茨
Chinese translations by Ma Yongbo 马永波 of the remaining part of ‘the name of water—for Yongbo’ 水之名 and ‘two soft horses of golden sunlight’ 两匹柔软的金色阳光之马 by Helen Pletts 海伦·普莱茨 and her biography in Chinese translation.
Ma Yongbo 马永波 purchased the above painting, ‘Two Horses’ by Hai Weng 海翁, in Harbin’s Chinese Baroque Cultural Street also known as Lao Daowai 老道外 and gifted the ‘Two Horses’ to Helen Pletts, April 2025. ‘two soft horses of golden sunlight’ 两匹柔软的金色阳光之马 by Helen Pletts 海伦·普莱茨 was her poetic response of gratitude to Ma Yongbo 马永波
Albatross
My blood is crude
A dull song
that doesn’t scan as it should
It stultifies these fingers
glues sternum to spine
occludes the workings of each eye
My blood covets
greedy in the dark
It will never have enough
While I’m asleep it leaches
into the soil into the sea
and there
two thousand miles from anything like me
it hardens and sharpens
slices seabirds out of the air
supplants their viscera
with board game organs
made to last a hundred lifetimes
builds nests of dolls’ house leavings
that double up as graves
in the guts of earthbound young
who cry out their numbered days
to the same blank sky
that has its blue hooks in my blood
And when they tear me open
and fill my veins with rain maybe
there will be an end to this
By Janet Lees 珍妮特·丽兹 Translated by Ma Yongbo 马永波
信天翁
我的血液粗粝
一首滞涩的歌
失却应有的韵律
它使这些指尖麻木
将胸骨与脊柱黏合
遮蔽每只眼的运转
我的血液充满贪念
在黑暗中饕餮
永远不会满足
当我沉睡时，它渗入
泥土，渗入海洋
在那里
距我这样的人两千英里之遥
它变得坚硬，锐利
将海鸟从空中劈落
用棋盘游戏的器官
替换它们的内脏
足以维系百代光阴
用玩偶屋的残骸筑巢
也用作坟墓
在困于陆地的幼雏腹中
它们向同一片空茫的天空
哭喊着屈指可数的时日
而天空的蓝钩正扎进我的血液
当它们撕开我的身体
以雨水注满我的血管——或许
这一切才会终结
珍妮特·丽兹
Bedtime
When I was eleven –
a ball of wildfire hissing at rules, lies,
cracks in the pavement, blurred desires –
they pinned me into the bedclothes
to starve my heart of air and light,
little knowing that inside I was water
compelled to run downhill towards
a huge man seen through trees at dusk,
as if he were my saviour.
Tonight, as I lie confined
to the same small place as yesterday,
he is running towards me.
I want to punch him
but I pray for him instead,
fill him up with holy smoke
until he falls down dead.
And now he walks again
into that Soho diner
with tangerine leather seats
and scorch marks on the walls.
He wants us to stay here
forever, he tells me,
picking burnt seeds out of his teeth,
sprinkling ashes into my cup
By Janet Lees 珍妮特·丽兹 Translated by Ma Yongbo 马永波
睡前
十一岁时——
我是一团野火，对规则、谎言、
人行道的裂缝、模糊的欲望嘶鸣——
他们将我按进被子里
让我的心脏缺失空气与光亮，
却不知我得内心是流水
注定朝山下奔去，奔向
黄昏树影间窥见的一个巨人，
仿佛他是我的救主。
今夜，当我再次困于
与昨日相同的狭小空间，
他正向我奔来。
我想挥拳相向，
却转而为他祈祷，
用圣烟将他填满
直到他倒地而亡。
可如今他又起身行走
走进苏荷区那家小饭馆
有橘色的皮革座椅
墙壁上烙着焦痕。
他想让我们永远留在这里
他告诉我说，
一边从他齿间剔出烧焦的种籽，
一边把灰烬撒进我的杯里
珍妮特·丽兹
House of water
He caught your untrained heart
the first time you watched him walk
the long white shore on his clever feet
and now you have caught him;
brought him, laid on the blade of your tail,
home to your house of water
washed him clean of his name
stroked away the sorrows
from his milk and butter skin
explained to him the secret ways of fish
and all the things you wish –
you, born of moonshine
blood part-brine part-stardust
daughter of the world’s misfortune –
your whole body singing all mine all mine
blind to his closed eyes
his salted lips
his silent heart.
Yours to keep. So bury him deep
in your bed of fool’s gold
until he turns to water too
then hold his bones and dream his tread
and rise to walk the sleepless shore
on dumbstruck feet
each step more painful than the last;
condemned to live as flesh and blood
when all you wanted was to love.
Inspired by the painting ‘The Depths of the Sea’ by Edward Burne-Jones
By Janet Lees 珍妮特·丽兹 Translated by Ma Yongbo 马永波
水之屋
当你第一次看见他用灵巧的双足
走过漫长的白色海岸
他便捕获了你未曾驯服的心
如今你也捕获了他；
将他置于你的尾刃之上，
带回你的水之屋
洗净他的姓名
抚去他的忧愁
从他乳脂般的肌肤
向他解释鱼类的秘径
以及你所有的祈愿——
你，生于月光之下
血液半是盐水半是星尘
身为世间苦难的女儿——
全身都在唱着“全是我的全是我的”
却看不见他紧闭的双眼
咸涩的嘴唇
沉寂的心脏。
你将他据为己有，把他深埋在
愚人黄金铺就的床榻
直到他也化作流水
然后抱着他的骨头，梦见他的步履
起身走向无眠的海岸
用麻木的双足
每一步都比前一步更疼痛；
注定要以血肉之躯存活
而你全部的所求不过是爱。
珍妮特·丽兹
注解：灵感源自爱德华・伯恩-琼斯的画作《海之深处》
Ma Yongbo 马永波 (b1964),
https://mayongbopoetry.wordpress.com/ has 10 published poetry collections. He is representative of Chinese avant-garde poetry, the founder of polyphonic writing and objectified poetics.He is the main poet-translator of Western postmodern poetry on the mainland, including Dickinson, Whitman, Stevens, Pound, Williams and Ashbery. Collected Poems of Ma Yongbo (four volumes, Eastern Publishing Centre, 2024) comprising 1600 poems, celebrate 40 years of writing poetry.
马永波（1964年生），个人网站：https://mayongbopoetry.wordpress.com/，已出版9部诗集。他是中国先锋诗歌的代表人物，也是复调写作与客观化诗学的创立者。作为中国内地西方后现代诗歌的主要诗人译者，他翻译了狄金森、惠特曼、史蒂文斯、庞德、威廉斯及阿什贝利等诗人的作品。《马永波诗集》（四卷本，东方出版中心，2024年）收录1600首诗作，以此纪念其40年诗歌创作生涯。
All images under individual copyright © to either Ma Yongbo 马永波 or Helen Pletts 海伦·普莱茨 or Janet Lees 珍妮特·丽兹
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