ACHIEVING RELATIVE STILLNESS by YU NU, translated from the Chinese by Ling Li

ACHIEVING RELATIVE STILLNESS

Now I’m already very slow but

my doctor urges me to slow down more.

Change your self-perception: you’re not tuna.

I used to run to catch the early subway now I jog

but I still can’t walk normally let alone stroll.

If I were in water it would be different:

less resistance. So is it just

because of the air? No. Hostility, attachment.

So the idea that water has less resistance is an excuse. I’m neither

tuna nor cuttlefish. Pamuk said:

“My Name is Red”—and it doesn’t refer to the color.

It’s hard to remember everyone’s names but you have to

answer the question of how to live relative to them: my doctor

reminds me. “Imagine you’re lost among them.”

If one day I’m lucky, and the subway is empty,

I could run inside the subway car as long as

I maintain the same speed as the subway. A state of

relative stillness, which is theoretically possible.

Author and translator bios:

Yu Nu is a contemporary Chinese poet, whose work is known for its resistance to lyric smoothness and its experimentation with syntax, abstraction, and what he has described as “anti-musicality.” He is the author of several poetry collections, including Snail and Host and Guest, as well as the novel Trance Park. Snail received the Yuan Kejia Poetry Award in 2019. His poetry explores the tension between language and perception, often unsettling conventional relationships between sound and meaning. His work has been translated into multiple languages, including English, German, Japanese, and Greek.

Ling Li is a Chinese poet writing in English. She is a doctoral student in poetry at Texas Tech University and holds an MFA in Creative Writing from George Mason University. Her Chinese poems have appeared in journals and anthologies including Shiyue, Poetry Monthly, and Youth. She was a finalist for 128 Lit International Chapbook Contest. Her recent work is forthcoming from Gulf Coast.

© Yu Nu. Translation © by Ling Li. All rights reserved.

home