Note: Mary Tang, a poet I follow and who has been translating my Spring Songs series into Chinese, wrote recently about her grandmother’s life and death, and after reading those posts on her blog I was moved to write the poem below. It is posted with her permission, and directly below is her translation. 

Unclaimed Grave

If you die on a holiday expect      to be buried without ceremony
in the vacant space between      an extended celebration

and getting back to business      as usual but there is nothing
more usual than the dead       Above her unclaimed grave

power lines have been hung       where a marker might
have been a tree is growing       It may only be growing

because those lines opened       up the sky for it to grow
from the matter forgotten by       sons but the tree’s leaves

are her prayer flags       and the wind rushing the gap
are all the other sons       sweeping her grave, they remember

that we were all once inanimate       matter  we were all
each other’s mother even       unintelligent motion

generates respect and love     the hum of the old world’s
roots is louder than       a foot print on the moon

*