Wednesday, September 17, 2014

POEM: "Dusk"



Dusk


Shanghai dusk, there is
something in the wind
(I can’t see what it is)
a woman might be good
smile and smell conjoint
maybe some nalaizhuyi
a love without study
a joy without learning
change plus knowledge
whichever is the case
tomorrow is coming fast
(morning to be different)
I sense transfiguration
I can see maybe three things.


© 2014 Rob Schackne

2 comments:

  1. The learnèd reader may well recall Christ’s Transfiguration, when he appeared in radiant glory to three of his disciples (Matthew 17:2 and Mark 9:2-3). But as far as I know -- which is only as far as I know -- my little poem isn't about that.

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  2. The term "nalaizhuyi" or grabbism was coined by the great modernist writer Lu Xun. According to the literary critic Shu-Mei Shih, it "advocates eclectic, confident borrowing from the foreign without fearing the possibility of enslavement by what one borrows." (It is of course fraught with that possibility.)

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