Noon in Beijing

 

Yongding river-Beijing

Every noon in Beijing,

Straight up at noon

 

The hands of official clocks reach out

And strangle anyone who passes by,

And when they are done,

They reach out and choke the sky,

And a little boy or a little girl dies

In Beijing.

 

No one cares.

Time is murderous here.

 

Every noon in Beijing

The Yongding river sits down

Like a famished peasant

Caked in grime beside the gutter 

Of Lake Beihai

To sit inconsolably with his grief

And play xiangqi1 alone.

 

No one asks him

If he has eaten.

No one asks how his children are.

 

The children of this river

Are long dead.

All games long over.

 

The river is now very red,

What remains of it.

 

Every noon in Beijing 

The north wind   

Hits like a hammer. 

 

Every noon in Beijing

The north wind  

Cuts like a sickle,

 

And every noon, straight up at noon,

A little boy or a little girl dies

In Beijing.

 

Every noon in Beijing

The north wind

Is forever rusted red

 

And this wind is read religiously

Like a state newspaper

That rifles past 

 

The feet of a sick pigeon

Or the tattered sandals of a desperate peasant

That move dazedly past Beijing’s official clocks

 

And every noon in Beijing

A little boy or a little girl dies.

 

No one cares.

Time is murderous here.

 

When I found myself at noon by

The Yongding river beside Lake Beihai

Standing near an official clock

Whose hands strangle passersby

Below tattered, smoggy clouds that leave

No scraps or crumbs

For the sick pigeons and peasants of the state,

 

Below tattered, smoggy clouds that leave

Not a mite or particle

For the sick pigeons and peasants of its hate, 

 

Below tattered, smoggy clouds that leave

Not a  drop or speck

For the sick pigeons and peasants and their fate, 

Famished beside a vagrant river 

Loosing again by checkmate,

Where all the little boys and girls die

At the hands of the official clocks

In Beijing

 

I felt like choking myself with

The Yongding river.

 

This isn’t propaganda.

 

Xiangqi=Chinese chess, the most popular game in China, not to be mistaken with Go, which is known as weiqi in China. 

 

One time zone in China-  Though China is almost as wide as the continental United States, the whole country is officially in just one time zone based on Beijing time.