Snow falls on snow, from the branches
down onto the snow below.
Now I cannot remember
how many snows have fallen.
Once I wished to remember
each snowfall, but I can’t,
just like I can’t recall each of my thoughts.
When snowlight brightens the room,
I stand by the eternal window
staring at the empty snowscape;
days find me like this.
Before going to sleep, late into the night,
I watch the world outside,
snow, darkness, sky; a passer-by lost half-way.
I am like a child, or like God,
who carefully counts his treasures, then calms down.
2003
Translated by Ma Yongbo and Helen Pletts 16th October 2024
雪落在雪上 snow falls on snow ⻢永波 译
雪落在雪上，从树枝
落向下⾯的雪
这已是第⼏场雪了
我已忘记。我曾经想记下
每⼀场雪，可我不能
正如我⽆法⼀⼀回忆起
当所有雪光映亮室内
我⻓久地站在窗前
望着外⾯⽆⼈的雪地时
到底在想着什么
这些⽇⼦我常常这样
在深夜临睡前，望望外⾯的世界
雪，⿊暗，天空，中途消失的⾏⼈
像⼀个孩⼦或者上帝
数数他的财富，然后才放下⼼来
2003
BIOs
Photograph: Ma Yongbo, 2024
Ma Yongbo @mayongbopoetry was born in 1964 in Heilongjiang
Province, China. As a poet, he is representative of Chinese avant-
garde poetry. He is also a leading scholar in Anglo-American
postmodernist poetry. He has published 7 poetry collections and over
eighty original works and translations. He is a professor in the Faculty
of Arts and Literature, Nanjing University of Science and
Technology. His studies centre around Chinese and Western modern
poetics, post-modern literature, and eco-criticism. His translations
from English include works by Walt Whitman, Emily Dickinson, Ezra
Pound, Wallace Stevens, William Carlos Williams, John Ashbery,
Henry James, Herman Melville, and May Sarton among others.
Notably one of Professor Ma’s early projects was the translation of Up
Late, American Poetry Since 1970 (1987) edited by Andrei Codrescu.
Interview of Ma Yongbo by Pat Nolan at The New Black Bart Poetry
Society | “for those who think poetry is still a crime”
Helen Pletts www.helenpletts.com @helen.pletts and Ma Yongbo
enjoy translating each other’s poetry. They are currently working on
their first forthcoming bilingual book with Pete Taylor at Open Shutter
Press https://www.instagram.com/petetaylorpoetry/profilecard/?
igsh=MXFhZjNybHlzdmdlbw==
Dan Leighton @danleighton is a poet, lyricist and musician. He is an engaging performer
and exceptional poetry reader who loves to communicate with his audiences with humour
and compassion. He writes regularly on themes of redemption, loss, longing and
incompleteness. He also has a fine line in comic poetry and song and can be persuaded to
read or sing them occasionally. His poetry is deceptively simple, often with multiple
conflicting meanings and layered with intense rhythmic patterns honed close to the intent
of the poem. He loves a good romcom, is obsessed with k-dramas, makes cheese and sews
clothes.
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