"perhaps our journey was already wrong from the beginning,
and therefore ends wrong too.
perhaps the lamps we light one by one
       are blown out by the winds, one by one.
perhaps i will have exerted myself to the utmost to light
the darkness
and i have no extra fire to keep warm. . . .
perhaps
ours was a call that couldn't be resisted;
we had and have no other choice."

my last song has evaporated
beyond that great divide.
the late afternoon sun stoops
to look in the window, shakes his head, then
walks away
and like me, he is destined
never to arrive at where he thinks he is going.

in my dreams i turn away slightly
and think of snow, those frozen tears
blinked back so many times. let me dream undisturbed.
let the wild swans of my nature
nurse their july wounds
on the balustrade of summer

the wind may strike me-- but my heart
still has the right to be happy
or unhappy

and when the time comes, my love,
don't be sad,
though there is no one to lift her skirt
no mischievous hand
to touch you
don't put my memory on a jade pedestal
don't turn back the pages
of the calendar
don't try to find
my autobiography
i was a fugitive, hiding
from the camera since childhood

remember me only as
that fierce geography
of the heart,
the perpetual scaffolding
of dreams,
do not bother to look
for me elsewhere
stand just south of now
as if
i have already returned