We Went Out After the Rain at Dusk
We went out after the rain at dusk
We went out after the rain at dusk
chasing sky for clouds.
The mountains
moved
with the weightless pace of their own time.
We walked down the hill,
stopping above the running water.
Shrubs blocked our view.
We thought of
Leopardi‘s solitary hill and hedge
the dead seasons meant nothing in that eternity.
The white clouds still surged, in an encompassed silence deeper than the quiet
itself.
You asked: do you see violence?
We Went Out After the Rain at Dusk
The deep blue outlines
carried out a battle
soundlessly,
as if they had never trembled in fear,
nor ever tasted sweetness.
We climbed another hill
(the one we often look at from the kitchen window),
and looked back –
the city shimmered
below us,
and those white mountains were still unreachable,
larger than the city,
light enough to float
Geologists once said that mountains form when the
huge force between tectonic plates collide, compress,
and rise; then they collapse under their own weight.
I asked AI about their height –
it inferred from a photo that they were around ten
thousand meters.
Dark clouds slowly approached from the other side of the hill,
yet we couldn‘t resist climbing higher,
until fine rain blocked our path,
soaking the heavy concrete road
into an indistinct summer scent.
We began to retreat.
Walking in the rain, we kept talking about painting.
The drizzle soaked my coat,
dark spots blooming one by one on the cotton fabric – in our damp steps, the
words spread, dissolving,
until they were unrecognizable.
Like those paintings
that face me in the studio
late at night.
Xiao Zhiyu