Two Halves of the Earth-Apple

1

I awake at dawn on the West Coast

As you enter dark night in the Orient

Planet earth is the letter “O”

It resembles an apple   a ball struck by God's bat

Sent on a spinning course through the cosmos

I toy with this metaphor so suited to Amerika

Yet I embrace my country's way of Taiji  

   in which the contrary poles of something

Are yin and yang fish chasing each others' tails

When I keep you in mind, I see this more clearly

What looms before my eyes are two pine trees

Trunks coiled with tensile strength   solidified shapes of storm

10,000 golden threads come through a sieve of needles

Casting gleams on water of a shallow pond

Green feathers of two wild ducks catch the morning light

2

I stroll on a puncheon trail down by the shore

Waves make the sea's skin white   the world slowly opens

The sky melts in pellucid depth   milky clouds spill across it

Past the sun's suspended medallion

As I reach the turn-in to Estate No. Eight

Again it comes back to me—the friendly Hi, hi

Of two buxom black girls, blended with seagull cries

Ringing out over the blue expanse of seawater

Reaching the globe's other half in an instant

The distance from sunrise to sunset

Has to pass through a gauntlet of barriers

Right now the next block's streetlight gets closer

Amid the hubbub of a meat and produce market

We walk past leaning together like two verdant leeks

A raised walkway yellows like paper in somnolent heat

Until the velvety skin of night is cooled by a footloose wind

Pale brow of moon and eyes of stars

Light insinuating into all corners

A grouse somewhere clucks twice

A text message from you

Swims the Pacific like a whale

In the palm of my hand   the East and West hemispheres

Are so near   like the girl next door

Written in May, 2014

Translated by Denis Mair