June is almost done. In all of June,
I didn’t finish a single thing.
Father is in bed,
smaller and smaller, day by day.
The time left to him by the world
isn’t much.
And how much is left to me?
I visit him three times per day,
nothing more than ten steps looking at five.
The south-facing window is always open.
Father crafted the wood lattice when he was a young man.
Last night, he awoke from a coma,
suddenly told Mother: When I’m gone,
bury me with my carpenter ax.
June is almost done. Cornstalks in the field
are as tall as a man.
The empty mountain is filled with cicada sounds.
Only newcomers comfort the leave-takers.
Only time receives the world’s enlightenment.
Translated from the Chinese by Melisa Cahnmann-Taylor and Kuo Zhang