July Is Around the Corner

Penglin Chen

July is around the corner
Close to the birth of gender
Love is close---beneath the horse’s nose
Qinghai Lake is salty 
Thus Qinghai Lake is close
Bundles of beehives alongside the lake
Grievous I appear
Green grass suffused with flowers 

On Qinghai Lake
my loneliness is like a horse in heaven
(Thus the horse in Heaven is not far away)
I am the seed of love: the wildflower being chanted in poems,
the only toxic flower in the heaven's horse's belly
(Qinghai Lake, please quench my love's flame)
I am still in love with her
With no herbs to heal
(Other prodigal men with wounds of love found solace for their pain, and returned to their birthplace, I wish to meet you）
Thus trudging across mountains and streams, death is around the corner 
Bones adorn my body, like branches floating on blue water,
All flash before my eyes
Birds who stay here for only five months flew away long ago
Only the first bird that sipped from my flow flew away long ago
Only Qinghai Lake remains, this gem-like corpse
On twilit waters, reflections aglow