English Original
how neat
the straw slippers
at the Zen meeting,
they speak
the wordless
Sanford Goldstein
Chinese Translation (Traditional)
草編拖鞋
多麼整齊地擺放
在禪宗會議入口處，
他們訴說
無言的修行
Chinese Translation (Simplified)
草编拖鞋
多么整齐地摆放
在禅宗会议入口处，
他们诉说
无言的修行
Bio Sketch
Sanford Goldstein has been publishing tanka for more than fifty years. He was born in 1925 and is now 96 years old. Long ago, he wrote haiku, but decided to focus on tanka. His latest books, three in the last two years, have each said this would be his last.
Ls 1-3 set the scene situated in a religious context while the unexpected yet thematically significant and emotionally evocative statement in Ls 4&5 "speaks volumes" about the religious "practice" of these meeting attendees.
ReplyDeleteIt might be interesting to do a thematic/theological comparative reading of my tanka below:
a few dollars
drop in his paper cup
the homeless man
lost in the flow of words
uttered by a priest
Atlas Poetica, 36, 2019