Ma Hua was born in Tianjin, China in 1972 and graduated from Fudan University. He started writing poetry and plays in university, and was a core member of Fudan Poetry Club and the head of Yanyuan Theatre Club. In 2004, He passed away in a car accident while volunteering as a village teacher in Yunnan. Posthumously a poetry collection Snow Mountain Tanka has been published.

SPRING SLUMBER by Ma Hua, trans. Winnie Zeng


At night, this year’s snow melts into a spring, knocks at the wooden door. 
Pi li pa la, a sound more wearing than the clamor of cattle and horses 
during the day. I dream that the tattered wooden door
turns out to be myself, knocked round and round 
by transparent snow, by the crescent moon.

 

Winnie Zeng writes and translates from Zhejiang, China. Her translation of Ma Yan’s poetry has been a finalist for the Anne Frydman Translation Prize and shortlisted for the Gabo Prize in Literary Translation. Other poetry and translation can be found in Poetry Northwest, the Offing, Black Warrior Review, and elsewhere.

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