happy new year

Venezia, dark & slow

the last rose

The rose’s beauty remains buried in the dark awareness that it has of its inevitable decline. An awareness that is its very being, its unfurling leading to the final wither. 

Its beauty is merely the death that labours in its blossoming.

Roger Munier

tr. by M. Tweed

the secret life of these stone women and men

Florence, 2013

the navel

november

People say the sea is deep —
it's not as deep by half as love.
The sea at least still has its coasts, 
love's farthest reaches have no shore.
With harp in hand I'll climb the tower
To empty rooms full of the moon,
And strum the song of missing him.
My heart and harp will break as one.

Li Ye
poet-courtesan (and perhaps Daoist nun), 
8th century

(note: i borrowed the first 4 lines of the translation from Women Writers of Traditional China, while the last 4 are translated by A.Z. Foreman, i liked his version better in this case)

on the way to Florence

autumn

I cross autumn fields
 In my dew-laden robes
 On my return home.
 Flowers woefully withered,
 Evening has yet to arrive.


Sōgi