Footsteps
Yang Mu

Walk with me into cicadas humming, into fretfulness
Count horses on the entablature
dust-kicking chestnut horses
Calculate age by the river's edge
Sleeper, your hands are pythons

He walks, a shifting shadow, slowly rises
through the palace
to where I sit cross-legged
leaving that empty space to me
yesterday's me

The spot where you drew water from the river
I turn to stare
A blue gourd floats
so do the traveler's lips
Give me ashes, loneliness in clamor
A rosary from the future moon and stars
Counting the beads, you put out the light I sought

North-northwest, beautiful fire watcher
coming from the forest, do you hear stars howling in the east?
The moon to the right, we cross the river at high speed