Ha Jin

We used to like talking about grief Our journals and letters were packed with losses, complaints, and sorrows. Even if there was no grief we wouldn’t stop lamenting as though longing for the charm of a distressed face. Then we couldn’t help expressing grief So many things descended without warning: labor wasted, loves lost, houses gone, marriages broken, friends estranged, ambitions worn away by immediate needs. Words lined up in our throats for a good whining. Grief seemed like an endless river— the only immortal flow of life. After losing a land and then giving up a tongue, we stopped talking of grief Smiles began to brighten our faces. We laugh a lot, at our own mess. Things become beautiful, even hailstones in the strawberry fields.

Sometimes when you’re walking in the street, returning home or leaving to see a friend, they come. They emerge from behind pillars and trees approaching you like a pack hounding a sheep. You know it’s no use to hide or flee, so you stop and light a cigarette, waiting for them. Sometimes when you’re eating in a restaurant, your soup served and your dish not ready yet, they come. A steady hand falls upon your shoulder. You are familiar with such a hand and don’t need to turn around to meet the face. The scared diners are sneaking out, the waitress’s chin is trembling when she speaks, but you are sitting there waiting for the bill. After settling it you’ll walk out with them. Sometimes when you open your office, planning to finish an article in three hours, or read a review, but first make some tea, they come. They spring out from behind the door like ghosts welcoming a child to their lair. You don’t want to enter, seeing cups and paper on the floor. You are figuring how to send a message home. Sometimes when you have worked day and night, dog tired, and want to have a good sleep after a shower and an extra nightcap, they come. They change the color of your dream: you moan for the wounds on your body, you weep for the fates of others. Only now you dare to fight back with your hands, but a “bang” or an “ouch” brings you back to silence and sleeplessness again. See, they come.

My friend came and spent a weekend here. In China he used to be an interpreter and guide foreign mountaineers. He told me he had once accompanied a group of Japanese to a snow mountain in the Uighur Region. They climbed for a whole day but did not make the summit. A storm was gathering, so they turned back. On their way down, a young woman (the only one on the team) fell off a cliff and disappeared in the ice below. She was injured but not fatally. “Help, help me!” she yelled at the men two hundred feet above her. None of them went down, though they were all well trained. They listened and turned on a recorder. “Help, help! I’ll pay you ten million yen!” Her screams were kept on a cassette tape for her family and insurance company. “Those Japs are beasts,” my friend said. “If she were a Chinese I would’ve gone down to help her.” His story saddened me. After he left, the voice still lingered in my home— “Help, I’ll pay you ten million yen!” I don’t know if he could be so gallant to a Chinese woman as he claimed. I’ve begun to walk my dog every day.

On the morning of the 20th National Day my uncle came home and told us: “All our troops have got into position, for the Russians may throw an atom-bomb on us today.” After breakfast he returned to the headquarters, but I had to go to school and join the celebration. The fear oppressed my back like a bag of sand. I could not raise the little triangle flag in my hand, nor could I shout slogans with my classmates. During the break I called together my best friends and told them what would occur on this day. Benli said, “I must go home and tell my dad to kill all our chickens.” Qingping said, “I must tell my aunt not to buy a sewing machine. Who would care about clothes if that happens.” Yimin and I said nothing, but we knew what we were going to do. We decided to go to the army, for we did not want to be roasted at home like little pigs.

My notebook has remained blank for months thanks to the light you shower around me. I have no use for my pen, which lies languorously without grief. Nothing is better than to live a storyless life that needs no writing for meaning— when I am gone, let others say they lost a happy man, though no one can tell how happy I was.

to L. Y. I was told that I was a sad man. Sadness is a fatal disease in this place where happiness is a key to success. If you are sad, you are doomed to fail— you can’t please your boss, your long face won’t attract customers, a few sighs are enough to let your friends down. Yesterday afternoon I met Pham, a Vietnamese man who was once a general. He came to this country after nine years’ imprisonment. Now he works hard as a custodian and always avoids meeting his former soldiers here, because every one of them is doing better than he is. “Sadness,” he told me, “is a luxury for me. I have no time for it. If I feel sad I won’t be able to support my family.” His words filled me with shame, although I learned long ago a busy bee feels no sorrow. He made me realize I’m still a fortunate one and ought to be happy and grateful for having food in my stomach and books to read. I returned home humming a cheerful tune. My wife smiled wondering why I had suddenly become lighthearted. My son followed me, laughing and frolicking, while I was capering on the floor. Last night I went to a party in my dream. Voices and laughter were drifting in a large hall that was full of paintings and calligraphy. Strolling with ease I ran into the handwriting of yours hung in the air piece by piece waving like wings. Dumbfounded, I turned and saw you sitting on a chair, motionless, the same lean detached face, only your blue clothes had grown darker. Something snapped in my chest and my tears flowed. What’s the use of promising? I have promised, a hundred times, but never returned. Wherever we go our cause is the same: to make a living and raise children. If a poem arises, it’s merely an accidental blessing. For several hours my heart ached, but I woke up—smiling.

I sing of an old land where the gods have taken shelter underground, where the human idols eat human sacrifice, where hatred runs the business of philanthropy, where blazing dragons eclipse the wronged ghosts, where silence and smiles are the trace of wisdom, where words imitate spears and swords, where truth is always a bloody legend. I speak of the old land not out of love or wonderment. Like my ancestors who were scattered into the smoky winds, who scrambled to leave home or rushed towards the approaching enemies, I join those who fled and returned, who disappeared in other lands bearing no hope but persistence, no honor but the story, no fortune but parents and children, singing a timeless curse, a curse that has bound us together and rooted us deep in the wreck of our homeland. I touch the land at night— My hands trace the map on the wall, from mountains to villages and to rivers, from plains to cities and to seashores. I see the green fields of the South, the dark soil and birch woods of the North, and snow swirling in summer. I dream of myself in that land, not for happiness or harvest. I dream of suffering together with my people, of being understood and useful, of being left alone and able to sleep, of my children refusing my land so they will not repeat my life, of talking and walking with friends, of completing the work and dying with ease. I weep for the old land, for its vast narrowness, for its profound stupidity, for its chaos and tenacity, for its power to possess those of my kind to devour us to nourish itself to seize our hearts and throats and mix our moans with songs— songs of monstrous grandeur and merciless devotion, songs crazed by the cycle of that land.

It is no use to beg anymore. He has begged them many times to let me speak to the head of the army hospital, but he’s told nobody will listen to him, a bad-egg, who only deserves a bullet. “We’ve been ordered to get your skin,” the squad-leader says, “to repair the extensive burns of Liu Yi who risked his own life saving horses from the burning stable. Now, let’s go.” They take him to the hill behind the hospital. It’s dinner time and the loudspeaker is playing music. Nobody will hear the shot in the woods. They stop at a ruined temple whose stones, bricks and rafters have been ripped off by the villagers. In the distance a light is shining like a glow-worm. He doesn’t know whether it’s a star or a lamp. It doesn’t matter now. He takes it as the pole-star. His only worry is: I’m not nineteen yet and my parents will never know how their son disappeared. “Now you may say something if you want.” They pull out the towel from his mouth and wait. Suddenly he starts yelling, “I curse all of you, the whole hospital! All your babies will have no ass-holes and die at birth! I curse Liu Yi and his family too! He and his folks will be struck by thunderbolts!” They raise their pistols and he raises his tied hands: “Long live the Chinese Communist Party! Long live—” One pistol fires. He wanted to shout “Chairman Mao,” but they wouldn’t let him get it out. The bullet hit his penis— which is the best way to save the skin.

We sat in the neon light on a cool evening of a summer day drinking beer and eating salad. You told me your story similar to those of many others: All your savings are gone, the managers, the secretaries, the supervisors, the police in charge of passports all having received a handsome share. Now you have nothing left there, your color TV and refrigerator were sold to get the cash for the plane ticket. “But I was lucky,” you assured me. “Many people have spent fortunes and still cannot leave the country.” “What are you going to do here? Don’t think this is a place where you can make a fortune by snapping fingers. Starting poor, we have to labor for every dollar. It is a place where money can hire the devil to make bean curd and your growth is measured by financial figures. There is no way for us to get beyond a social security number.” “Anything, I would do anything, as long as I can make a living. At least, I am free here and don’t hate others. Do you know what I wanted when I was back there? I always imagined how to get a gun so I could shoot all the bastards. That country is not a place to live— I would rather die than go back.” We stopped to watch seagulls. An airplane was writing the word FUN in the distant sky. I wish I had left the same way, but I brought with me all my belongings, even my army mug and a bunch of old letters.

Once I have the freedom to say my tongue will lose its power. Since my poems strive to break the walls that cut off people’s voices, they become drills and hammers. But I will be silenced. The starred tie around my neck at any moment can tighten into a cobra. How can I speak about coffee and flowers?