A LEAF FROM A BROKEN DIARY

[mahuairong]

By Ma Huairong
What does China look like?
a group of square characters?
a chain of Taoist or Buddhist temples
along the remote and uneven mountain slopes?
Or a piece of gray sky dotted with golden streaks
over the Royal Court as that in a snap shot?
Has China hidden its true face
in a collection of thread-bound documents?

Yes or No is both right to these questions.
There is an old saying in China
Facts are stronger than rhetoric.
The theories are gray yet the life trees evergreen.
I have found it easier to reveal this historical panorama
of the mystery with my own experiences.

Here is a ballad of my generation:
Born into starvation, we were
Schooled in no schooling, we were
While parents were we,
We have to be the parents of the ONLY ONE.

I was born in December, 1956 in Pingdu,
an ancient town to the north of Qingdao,
in the home of my maternal grandmother.
In October, 1961, my family moved back
to my father’s home village in Huangxian County
Who had resigned from his post in a government office
because of the so called three-year natural disasters.

I began my formal education in 1962.
I graduated from a town middle school
in January 1973. After my graduation,
I went back to my home village to be working
in the fields as a commune member.

I had been working there for more than five years.
At the same time I began to teach myself English,
history, philosophy, writing, especially English.
I craved also for books, books of sciences.
I gave up with no teachers or tutors to assist.
Out of my expectation, China had changed.
In the winter of 1977 I took part in an examination.
The college entrance examination I passed.
And at the beginning of the next year, 1978,
I went to Yantai Teacher’s College for English study.
What a college to please!
What a department to please!
What a language to please!

That was the first time I left my home
for faraway on my own choice.
When summer vacation came I returned home.
to my amazement,
I found my home village much meaner and smaller.

The streets and lanes became shorter and narrower,
Enthusiastically I greeted the home villagers.
They just nodded or briefly responded
or eyed me with strange looks.

This summer vacation was of great significance
in the transformation of my world outlook.
I was fortunate and lucky in a family disaster
to transport myself to Peking for a visit.

My grandmother lived over there
with her eldest and youngest daughters.
My mother was the fourth in her family.
At that time she was seriously ill in hospital.
After a period of medical treatment
she stayed in her sister’s homes for recovery.

My aunts’ were near Nanyuan Airport from which
airplanes took off and touched down at every minute.
My aunt told me that on a day, a strange day,
how a strange noise of wind broke the sky.
Nixon, the 37th President of the United States
Paid his Peking Visit and he landed there.

The populace was eager to see the opening up
For the reform might bring about some change.
My aunt related her own experiences as a driver.
The Americans are certainly to bring some hope.
(to be continued.)
_________________
You see me, you lose me

[Lake]

I understand what the poem is talking about. But I'm sorry to say it reads more of a prose than a poem to me especially when the ballad starts. It may be just me, though.