Tune for a Peaceful Night

by Li Yuansheng
     trs. by Chen Xiaoyuan

When you read love, love’s already gone
When you read spring, it’s been the season of fallen leaves

One may read what another wrote
after a cup of tea, sometimes, after this life

I like the self I’ve pruned, while many love, the branches I
trimmed
Till the wonder comes, you catch me up by reading

When you read the silence of a grain of sand
inside which, I am in the midst of its raging sea