Dragon 龙

Softly the silk unrolls
aside the inkstone
– “翻云为墨海为砚”,
and I start to get lost
among a million dreams of
the mighty creature, when
two eyes emerge from
the mirror of ink - it’s you,
your icy, blue eyes,
easel proudly standing behind
the turpentine jar. You speak
a language I haven’t learned
– ‘Draig,Y Ddraig Goch,
Gadewch i ni greu y ddraig.’
Dragon. A red dragon,
that’s what you were saying
– ‘Let’s draw a dragon.’

I wonder how,
these enormous shadows could
share the same name while bearing
so much difference – like how
we draw, we sleep and talk.
Our deepest dreams cringing
in a tiny stream of blood–
you hear the women who miscarry,
on May Day these horrid screams
belatedly ends in mead. Or, the castle
demolished overnight, the boy born
with no father – hidden lake, you see
rays entwinning, red and white.
But I stand among mountains in the North,
- “西北海之外，赤水之北。”
- “其神人面龙身而无足。”
- “视为昼，瞑为夜，
- 吹为冬，呼为夏。”
For once I am a forgotten child,
watching how days come and pass,
rivers turned over—a scaly figure rests
beneath the muddy yellow water.
- “有龙飞入民间楼舍”
“Smoke soon rises and villages burned. “
Long behold the flaming sky,
I hear the blessing from stars:
“The Green Dragon is winged,
therefore is the True Dragon.”
I wonder why these mighty ones
not only show love but too destroy.

And so do I wonder:
“Are we really too different?”
My dragons stretch their claws fiercely
on your canvas, skin in tender gloss.
Over the light and dark ink strokes,
my silk safely holds the lair of
your red dragon, in Gongbi it reposes
with every glorious scale. Then we both
feel the desire to stand, fearlessly,
to fight for a rising sun, to claim
our existence against misfortune.
We really are not too different,
my eyes black and yours blue, while
the cosmos blooms in infinite colors.