Someone will be set free and stay as eternal
as the green of the dry season
Someone will be set free and be as sour-black
as the monsoon
Someone will be set free and will run
or tire
And the sky will shrink and the stars
Shift
And between the pole of the seven flags and the pale peak
of the pagoda
Someone will be set free
and disappear
But perhaps someone will be set free and see
the dangling stems
stems on the handkerchief tree,
stems on the slopes of the road
to Mandalay
1996-1997
(Translated from the original by Eddin Khoo)