Chinese People

Those migrant workers who have to demand their wages.

148 pairs of battered hands

held out from Daqing’s caved-in mine.

Li Aiye, who caught AIDS after giving blood.

The shepherd bachelors of the loess slopes.

Gossipy women licking a finger to count money.

Hair salon girls: unlicensed sex-workers.

Peddlers engaged in a running battle with city authorities.

Old bosses

in need of a sauna.

The 9 to 5 tribe off to work on their bicycles.

Good-for-nothings with no where to go and nothing to do.

The bar-room wasters. Old men

sipping tea as they pet songbirds.

Scholars who fill the heads of their listeners with fog.

Derros, punters, porters stinking to high heaven;

dandies, beggars, doctors, secretaries (and secret mistresses into the bargain);

workplace clowns

and other supporting actors.

From the Avenue of Heavenly Peace to the Guangzhou Road

I have yet to see “the Chinese people” this winter;

I've seen ordinary, speaking bodies

keeping each other warm

on buses day after day.

They're like grimy coins:

their users hand them over frowning

to society.          

Written on 2004

Translated by Simon Patten