Wednesday 27 May 2015

弔詭/弔念:Cioran and my fragmented poem (Chinese & English)


By all evidence we are in the world to do nothing.” ~Emil Cioran

The ideal life for a muser and a paresseuse would be: to dream in the absence of dreams, and to dream of the absence of dreams, in other words, to dream nothing at all. The grandest thing to muse upon, would be those intricately-woven, beautifully-entangled illusions of all there is, i.e. nothingness—all of it, that is all there is. It’s just that long and inevitably mundane process (with perhaps some specks of high drama) one has to go through, could seem interminable.

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Some more words from Emil Cioran to further tickle me:

To live entirely without a goal! I have glimpsed this state, and have often attained it, without managing to remain there: I am too weak for such happiness.”

I don’t understand why we must do things in this world, why we must have friends and aspirations, hopes and dreams. Wouldn’t it be better to retreat to a faraway corner of the world, where all its noise and complications would be heard no more? Then we could renounce culture and ambitions; we would lose everything and gain nothing; for what is there to be gained from this world?

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the Chinese original of this poem (titled 玉) was written in 1999,
English translation/re-composition (re-titled Celadon) was created in 2011-2


蒼白,是血的原色與美學的逆鱗。
他舌尖的蓮消蝕一如
右頰的月光
聲音是時間與蛇的舞姿
交纏蜿蜒的連綴
而生存,歌詠著水波紊亂
殞落著無性之魅
猩紅,似卵與熱的曲線
錯誤的春花秋月
頹萎之靡交合在古印度的菱鏡
天人於是註定了五衰
水面下的墜


Brett Whiteley, A Day at Bondi, 1984 // etching, black ink on white wove paper

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