Poem
Yao Feng
In St Mary\'s Hospital, Manchester
From white-coloured blankets, you hold out one hand to meslender, withered, red nails painted with Cutex
like plum blossom, dazzling winter’s branchings
These nails, these flowers – trimmed again and again by you
again and again to let their fury bloom
They stand at your life’s boundary with body
but always so clean, so astounding
even here in this
national hospital chaotic as the nation itself
Firm grip on your hand, I feel the tawny blood-veins bulge
Blood squirms, turning back from scarlet fingertips
You wrote in a book somewhere: in death’s fleshly body
the last thing of all of us to rot is our nails
© Translation: 2009, Tao Naikan and Simon Patton
IN ST MARY\'S HOSPITAL, MANCHESTER
© 2009, Yao Feng
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Poems of Yao Feng
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In St Mary\'s Hospital, Manchester
From white-coloured blankets, you hold out one hand to meslender, withered, red nails painted with Cutex
like plum blossom, dazzling winter’s branchings
These nails, these flowers – trimmed again and again by you
again and again to let their fury bloom
They stand at your life’s boundary with body
but always so clean, so astounding
even here in this
national hospital chaotic as the nation itself
Firm grip on your hand, I feel the tawny blood-veins bulge
Blood squirms, turning back from scarlet fingertips
You wrote in a book somewhere: in death’s fleshly body
the last thing of all of us to rot is our nails
© 2009, Tao Naikan and Simon Patton
In St Mary\'s Hospital, Manchester
From white-coloured blankets, you hold out one hand to meslender, withered, red nails painted with Cutex
like plum blossom, dazzling winter’s branchings
These nails, these flowers – trimmed again and again by you
again and again to let their fury bloom
They stand at your life’s boundary with body
but always so clean, so astounding
even here in this
national hospital chaotic as the nation itself
Firm grip on your hand, I feel the tawny blood-veins bulge
Blood squirms, turning back from scarlet fingertips
You wrote in a book somewhere: in death’s fleshly body
the last thing of all of us to rot is our nails
© 2009, Tao Naikan and Simon Patton
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