I Fell Off the Dream

Translations

Photograph by Woeser.

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I Fell Off the Dream

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I dreamed of my mother faintly smiling.

In the dream, my mother and I once again pressed our foreheads together.

In the dream, I seemed to be kinder to my mother….

At that moment, I heard the voice of a dead soul:

"The two absent ones: you and I

you and I are the two absent ones."

And, just as "the horse fell off the poem,"

I fell back to this life without you.

It's not absence, but a wordless loss—

a bee sucking the vague fragrance

of a withered osmanthus in vain.

I am already standing

in the crossroads of some foreign place

soundlessly crying...

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—Woeser, October 21, 2024

Translated by Ian Boyden, October 21, 2024

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Note: The verse quoted is excerpted from the poem "The Horse Fell Off the Poem" by the Palestinian poet Mahmoud Darwish. My friend Ian Boyden sent them to me just as I woke up from this dream.

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Constellations of Humanity

Each luminous dot on this map represents one reader of this poem. As the number of readers increases, the stars begin to cluster and form an increasingly detailed constellation. My intent is to show how brightly a poem glows across our world. I welcome your light.