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

Wednesday, October 10, 2018

Selected Tanka Prose: A Short Story about Love

at her window
two shadows entwine
in one embrace ...
like vampires sucking blood
from my memories

Sitting at my desk, swathed in darkness, I use the new telescope to zoom in on them – watch her rise and fall as the man guides her slow circular movements. His hands slide up from her hips to her breasts, continue to her shoulders, altering her rhythm, pulling her down onto him... 

I open the drawer, take out a pocket knife, rush down to the basement parking lot, and find his piercing red Jaguar. Crouching, I plunge the tip of the knife into one of his tires with climactic fierceness; then I stab and I stab...the second, third, and fourth.

I rip out
each page of our life
this sultry night
the dream soaks my bed
with her moaning

hedgerow, 12, December 12 2014