Chen-ou Liu's Translation Project: First English-Chinese Haiku and Tanka Blog

Wednesday, November 20, 2024

Mountain Lion and Flocks of Sheep Tanka

Between Heaven and Hell, VIII
first fable tanka written for the cheering crowds of Donald Trump's supporters

just a dream, and yet ...
the mountain lion roaring
to flocks of sheep,
once elected as your King
I'll be vegetarian



FYI: for more about fable, see To the Lighthouse: Fable Tanka

Saturday, November 16, 2024

Melting Clock Haiku

Between Heaven and Hell, IV
first magical realist haiku

wall-to-wall mirrors
in his presidential suite ...
a melting clock ticks



FYI: "Magic realism or magical realism is a "style of literary fiction and art. It paints a realistic view of the world while also adding magical elements, often blurring the lines between fantasy and reality...excerpted from my "To the Lighthouse" post, Magical Realism in Times of Crises"


Added: Between Heaven and Hell, V

post-election blues ...
yet the stump jagged with some twigs
stretching upward


AddedAgainst the Drowning Noise of Other Words, CXXIV: "armless Gazan"

smoky sunbeams 
through tattered olive trees ...
an armless Gazan


Added: Between Heaven and Hell, VI

ka-kis-to-cracy ...
my English teacher's voice
quivering
as U-S-A! chants get louder
from the crowd outside the school


FYI: The first part of the word comes from the Greek kákisto(s), meaning “worst.” So kakistocracy means “government by the worst.” The earliest known use of the word was in the 1600s by Paul Gosnold, a loyalist to King Charles I during the English Civil War.


Added: Between Heaven and Hell, VII

in morning chill
a youth's gaze at the billboard
dripping red:
your body, My choice pasted
over my body, my choice


FYI: The New Yorker, Nov.14: A New Rallying Cry for the Irony-Poisoned Right: It took less than twenty-four hours after Trump’s reëlection for young men to take up a slogan that could define the coming era of gendered regression: “Your body, my choice.”

PBS, Oct.31: Trump: I will 'protect the women' ... 'like it or not'

And The Indian Express, Nov.17: ‘Your Body, My Choice’ vs 4B movement: The radical movement is an answer to the clock turning back

The movement consists of four ‘nos’ — no dating, no sex, no marriage, and no childbearing. It is a radical approach, but perhaps one whose time has come given the tumultuous fight for bodily autonomy American women have been undergoing.


Added: Between Heaven and Hell, VIII
written in response to CNN News, Nov.18: "With swastika flags and bellowed slurs, neo-Nazi marchers strode through Columbus. Ohio" (J.D. Vance's home state)

Back in Business
It's Cleanup Time!
dripping red paint ...
I turn away when MAGA men
stab me with their eyes

Friday, November 15, 2024

Black and White

The verdict blasts from the wall-mounted TV. The diners, mostly white, freeze, and the silence falls over the room. Suddenly, clapping, cheering, and yelling from waiters and the kitchen staff.

frosty window
in gathering dusk I stare
into my reflection

Tuesday, November 12, 2024

Monday, November 11, 2024

Land of the Free

early leaf fall ...
I drift where the thoughts
of my exile life
take me today [ten years
and an ocean apart]

in dim light
I'm just a temp in the attic
waiting alone
for another gig ...
chants from afar of USA!

Sunday, November 10, 2024

A Day, As Usual

written in response to the Great War's/World War I's slogan: the war to end all wars.

war after war news
lengthening the morning chill
Remembrance Sunday

Remembrance Parade
shoulder to shoulder to shoulder
headless shadows



FYI: "It was the British author, H.G. Wells, that coined the expression: 'The war that will end war' to describe World War One, which had broken out in Europe in September 1914. Wells believed the conflict would create a new world order that would make future conflict impossible."

And Geneva Academy of International Humanitarian Law: Today, it monitors more than 110 armed conflicts and provides information about parties, the latest developments, and applicable international law. Some of these conflicts make the headlines, others do not. Some of them started recently, while others have lasted for more than 50 years.


Added:

a thin layer of dust 
on the Unknown Soldier Statue
Remembrance day


Added:

Remembrance Day
an armless veteran sighs
what is life worth?

Saturday, November 9, 2024

Ripped Tents and Fireballs Haiku

Against the Drowning Noise of Other Words, CXXIII: "ripped tents and fireballs"

puddles outside
and inside miles of ripped tents ...
fireballs bursting skyward



FYI: The following haiku set haiku could be read as its sequel:

Against the Drowning Noise of Other Words, XCIX: "somewhere out there"

Somewhere Out There

a girl stares long
at the the borderless sky
Rafah crossing

the great beyond

of fire
a pillar
ladders 
a boy 

Friday, November 8, 2024

Sound of Gray Haiku

Between Heaven and Hell, II

windy post election
oak leaves tossed into
the sound of gray



FYI: The oak, the official national tree of the United States, was chosen through a nationwide vote, and it was selected because it symbolizes the strength of the nation.


AddedBetween Heaven and Hell, III
first visual magical realist tanka

USADecides:
TheSecondDumbing 
theredhotheadline
morphsintomarching
phalanxafterphalanx


FYI: For more examples, see "To the Lighthouse: Magical Realism in Times of Crises"

Thursday, November 7, 2024

Dust Motes Haiku

dust motes in moonlight this illusion of not being alone

Modern Haiku, 55:3, 2024

Wednesday, November 6, 2024

One Breath Tanka

these shooting stars ...
just for a moment I think
of my younger self
blowing out twelve candles
in one breath


Hindi Translation:

ये टूटते तारे...
बस एक क्षण के लिए मैं सोचता हूँ
बचपन में वो मेरा
बारह मोमबत्तियाँ बुझाना
एक सांस में

Tuesday, November 5, 2024

Silence of a River Haiku

finally free ...
I float in the silence
of a river


Hindi Translation

पूर्णतः स्वतंत्र …
मैं नदी की चुप्पी में 
बहती

Monday, November 4, 2024

Smoggy Sunrise Haiku

No More Fairy Tales, XXXVII

leafless trees rub
against the smoggy sunrise
smell of the wind



FYI: BBC News, Nov.3: Schools close in Lahore as pollution hits record level

Unprecedented air pollution in the Pakistani city of Lahore has forced authorities to close all primary schools for a week.

From Monday, 50% of office workers will also work from home, as part of a "green lockdown" plan. Other measures include bans on engine-powered rickshaws and vendors that barbecue without filters...

Raja Jehangir Anwar, a senior environment official, said the "biggest headache" causing the smog was the practice of burning crop waste, known as stubble, across the Indian border.

Aurangzeb said the fumes were “being carried by strong winds into Pakistan”.


And this haiku could be read as a sequel to its preceding entry:

No More Fairy Tales, XXXVI

New Delhi draped
in layers of toxic haze
this sense of dread
as October rolls around
chokingly dark... and darker



FYI: New Delhi started the week with a PM 2.5 concentration nearly 80 times the World Health Organization’s recommended limit, according to Swiss air quality company IQAir (2023 survey) 


Added: Against the Drowning Noise of Other Words, CXXII: "bombed schools"

a drift of olive leaves ...
my Gazan friend's kin living
in various bombed schools


FYI: This haiku is a sequel to the following:
Against the Drowning Noise of Other Words, CXIX: "olive harvest in the West Bank"

the sun glints
on a settler's M-16 ...
olive harvest



Added: Between Heaven and Hell, I

Two Americas

the White House
surrounded by a metal fence 
ten feet high ...
this is America, and yet
the other America

this chilly night
stretching thousands of miles
behind the day
November 6th, the veil thinnest
between Heaven and Hell

Not Going Back
painted in large blue letters
on the billboard
in autumn morning chill
Not crossed out with red paint

raindrops stream
down Lady Liberty's face
in my mind's eye
the convicted felon stands
on top of the White House


FYI: "The other America" first appeared in Martin Luther King Jr's "March 14, 1968" speech (where he was interrupted over and over by hecklers calling him a traitor), describing the differences in what life is like for Black/African-Americans. And Former U.S. Senator and former presidential candidate John Edwards used the "Two Americas" concept in a 2004 speech, making it into a catch phrase referring to social stratification.

And Haaretz, Nov. 6Trump's Win Reveals the Inconvenient Truths About America

These two Americas are generally divided by two fault lines – education and gender – and are underlined by two very different political-social-cultural coalitions. Political scholar and journalist Ron Brownstein encapsulated them astutely and incisively as "transformative" and "restorative."

The "transformative" Democratic coalition is a diverse grouping made up of women, non-white Americans, voters with college degrees, urbanites and big metropolitan suburbanites, liberals and younger voters.

The "restorative" Republican electoral coalition is predominantly white, male, lower-middle class or working class, rural or living in a town of less than 100,000, without a college degree (mostly), earning less than $100,000 and angry that the America they know is "being taken away from them" by those liberal coastal elites who control the government.

Sunday, November 3, 2024

Man-Child Tanka

Game Show, 2024, LXXI

this man-child fullmouths
frack and drill, baby, frack and drill
with a meaty smile ...
I turn off the TV, gazing
at cracked corners of my world

NeverEnding Story, November 3 2024


For more about Donald Trump being a man-child, see PopMatters, Feb.9, 2017: The Spoiled Little Man-Child They Made King: Celebrity, Richard II, and Donald Trump.

And Special Feature: Selected Tanka for Reflections on This Convicted Felon and Man-Child, Donald Trump


Added: Game Show, 2024, LXXII

Trump fan and foe
face to face
in stony silence
at the anti/rally
their cars kissed passionately

Saturday, November 2, 2024

Friday, November 1, 2024