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Yuan Hongbing: Altar

June 27, 2007

Altar (祭壇)

Yuan Hongbing (袁红冰)

Ardent hearts,
doused
in dead-cold desolation.
Blasted hearts,
changed
to massive crags, wind-riven.

At the top of these rocky crags,
an altar, endlessly rebuilt.
And offered there,
offered there:
hardened blood, a single drop;
glittering ice, a single piece;
feathery sunlight, one gold gleam.

The sunlight is pain and sorrow, carved on iron bones,
the cold ice, grief and mourning; it will not melt away.

And

The hardened blood—
the hardened blood—
one night’s legacy: 6/4.