English Original
in a city
drifting among
strangers
sometimes I want
nothing more
Take Five: Best Contemporary Tanka, II, 2009
Michael McClintock
Chinese Translation (Traditional)
在一個城市
的陌生人當中
飄蕩
有時候
我什麼都不要
Chinese Translation (Simplified)
在一个城市
的陌生人当中
飘荡
有时候
我什么都不要
Bio Sketch
Michael McClintock's lifework in haiku, tanka, and related literature spans over four decades. His many contributions to the field include six years as president of the Tanka Society of America (2004-2010) and contributing editor, essayist, and poet for dozens of journals, anthologies, landmark collections and critical studies. McClintock now lives in Clovis, California, where he works as an independent scholar, consultant for public libraries, and poet. Meals at Midnight [tanka], Sketches from the San Joaquin [haiku] and Streetlights: Poetry of Urban Life in Modern English Tanka, are some of his recent titles.
The closing statement of Ls 4&5 enhances the tone and mood of the opening lonely image of Ls 1-3. And "sometimes" in L4 subtly reveals the speaker's ambiguous feeling about being alone (After all, human beings are a social species that relies on cooperation to survive and thrive)
ReplyDeleteAnd my tanka below could be read as a counter-response/sequel to Michael's:
strangers when we met
strangers again by morning --
but for one night
you touched me
behind my mask
Cattails, April, 2021