He Shuangqing

I stand beneath the osmanthus tree in your humble, old yard, in the seventeenth century, watching you. You lean against the wooden door, eyes fixed on the narrow mud path outside, which still holds the fading footprints of your best friend, Xi Han. A gust of wind sweeps through, stirring a small pile of leaves in the corner. Some carry your poems, written in pollen powder, dancing into the air. I want to chase them, but you remain still, ignoring them as they drift away.

a shooting star
falls silently—
down to the earth

**Shuangqing was a peasant woman who was skilled in writing poems, living in the seventeenth century in China, but died at twenty years old.