Sunday, June 19, 2016

A Li Tianjing Poem



The Pain You See


See there’s a dark bone
our hero at the tip of a knife
in an old black and white movie

It shows an awful persistence–
the results are definitely positive.
The disease is in the bone.

The doctor’s report is written in cuneiform.
Birds come and turn over the leaves
before they leave a couple more.

Guess at the thing growing in the bone
some places more and some places less.
We wait for the numbers to be less.

In fear also dwells the pain.
My wife’s doctor holds it

a bloody stone in his hand.

What was taken out?
One pain that cannot be treated.
Such is the problem with ideology.


(2004)


Version by Rob Schackne (2016)

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