1
I sink time in the corners of my eyes
Time reddens the sacred night
Suddenly night is a winter myth
Immense wings from endless space
2
Since then, I’ve returned to the numinous sphere
Blue spreads out, obscuring endless space
The night star stretches deep into the distance
Real or unreal, the afternoon’s wet with grief
In an afternoon like that, low notes hum
The notes go on, burning my fingertips
Embracing a rest, the music suddenly stops
Where are you, friend? Smoke fills the verandah
3
On a sharp note
The music grows heavy
Bitterness keeps imprinting
Itself on my lips
The music sinks deep
Into illusions
Heartbeats cease
Emptying time
Time stops
The sky burns
A thread of smoke
Loosens in time
Friend, you keep going
Moss thins on the threshold
Fading sunlight
Wild grass by the river
4
Flying, I follow a flickering flame
Shimmering in the summer desert
Half the sky tilts downward
Two red eyes by a velvet curtain
How deep the stars of Lyra
How lonely the road back
5
I return in the afternoon
You paint with a faded yellow
Road-dust dries the moonlight
The road fades
The moon shines alone
Did you ever wait
For sunburnt moss in the night?
6
Darkness spreads over the stone wall
I can’t forget your farewell eyes
Then you disappeared
Leaving anger on the crest of the wind
Where am I?
How fleeting the wings of dreams
7
Smoke from the teapot thins
Words keep stretching out
Worldly affairs like wild flowers
Cover my burning eyes
8
The princess leaves resentment in the rest
The cadence pains my fingers
I press grief more deeply into the white keys
A half-note disturbs the rhythm of exile
9
My burning eyes
Black keys white keys
Black and white pursue
Each other into mirage
At the end
Of the whole-rest
I leave my years
Of sorrow
10
The door is closed clouds roll in the distance
Distracted, I count words my eyes blur
My sad fingers stroke the crumbling incense
Light rain falls on a few clustered houses
11
In summer, cicadas return at once to the city
A grove of old trees screens bleak sunlight
White dust rolls at the end of an alley
On the keys, the scent of incense fades
The sound of cicadas ripples softly
Their summer cry will dry up the whole ocean
12
The Taoist sees himself in the stream
In the night, who could forget those eyes?
He hurries across rough crevices
Bird tracks wear away the stone
13
Oh! a string has suddenly snapped
It’s the night ghost become real
I bite the frozen tips of my fingers
The refrain settles in my eyes
Then the cadence subsides
The notes scatter my fingers sting
Then I sense the delicate scent of laurel
After the rest, slower now, the refrain
14
Night falls
Shadows gather
Ice-cold music stirs
Furious heartbeats
Near the border
Tall trees turn fiercely red
Warriors old as ancient tombs
Sunlight wanes on the battlefield
Blood thickens the mist
15
A day is adrift at the head of the rapids
I hear the restless call of nothingness
The melody flows into my eyes
The lake is still flickering water
The lake is still a mass of color
Images dim a bit of clear mist
A silent space time falls like rain
I hear life in the pristine world performance
16
Dusting off my hands, I’m frightened by chaos
I follow ants down the slope of a barren peak
17
Breath is stopped from deep in the sea
Immense forms myriad colors
A sky with small stars spins in the doorframe
A moment the Milky Way a flare of light
18
A car passes by on the street
A laurel branch trembles
In the rest, the scent diffuses
The circular melody glistens
19
Shadow of falling grass I’m startled
The ground shakes demons fill the world
On the rest a fleeting breath
Mysterious night song without words
20
I follow the ants
And slip through a clump of grass
A somber shadow
A tumbling world
In a moment of silence
I hear the earth breathe
21
That nostalgia, yearning
Slipping through hair
A sad coil of smoke
In a circle of arms
I haven’t finished my tea
Dew is falling
On a high terrace
You sit as if
On a very high throne
The path of clouds rises
Then closes up
Wearing away the illusion
Of heavenly truth
Oh, the laurel
Blinding the eyes
Why do you keep playing
That music?
That old tune
Dejected, a little sad
Back then I loved you
Restless mountain moon
22
I live again in sorrow blackened with smoke
Love, in every moment of my dreams
Words, unspoken even in ancient times
Like the ocean collecting peach-flower petals
Music echoes, cheers my weary wings
For love, I’m reaching out to catch stars
23
Tear-stained afternoon rain
Falls on ancient tombs
Ruined shadows of legends
Stand alone
A chilly mist
My shoulders resist the laurel
Embracing a stupa
I love, throughout pure space
Born Pham Van Thuong on Feb 15, 1943 in Pakse, Laos, Tuệ Sỹ became a monk at a very early age. A well-known dissident in Vietnam, he was imprisoned for fourteen years, and remains one of the foremost scholars of Buddhism in the country. English translations of his poems by Nguyen Ba Chung and Martha Collins have appeared in Gulf Coast, Two Lines, Consequence, Salamander, AGNI, and elsewhere.
Nguyen Ba Chung is a writer, poet and translator. He is the co-translator of A Time Far Past; Mountain River: Vietnamese Poetry from The Wars 1948-1993; Distant Road ‑ Selected Poems of Nguyen Duy; Six Vietnamese Poets; Zen Poems from Early Vietnam, and others. He served for many years as Research Associate at the William Joiner Institute at U.Mass.-Boston.
Martha Collins is the author of ten collections of poetry, most recently Because What Else Could I Do (Pittsburgh, 2019), Night Unto Night (Milkweed, 2018) and Admit One: An American Scrapbook (Pittsburgh, 2016). She has also co-translated four volumes of Vietnamese poetry. She founded the creative writing program at the U.Mass.-Boston and taught at Oberlin College for ten years.