Song of the Wagons

by Neil Flowers

Song of the Wagons
     after Du Fu, 712–770

Wagons rumble grumble. Horses whinny neigh.
Yeomen, bows and arrows strapped to waist,
parents wives children barring the way
pulling at their clothes blubbering goodbye goodbye
stamping their feet cloaking Xianyang bridge
in swirling dust. And the wailing, weeping
shouts assail black anvil clouds.

On the road’s shoulder a citizen cries, Why? Why?
A conscript calls out: The draft snares us all.
At fifteen, he mutters, many quit north to guard the river,
at forty, forced to till fields in the west.
When we departed, elders blessed our heads
back now, snow–capped, once more we’re shipped to the border.
Those frontier posts are a sea of blood:
The martial emperor’s endless dream of empire.
East o’ the mountains: Two hundred districts, have you ’scried ’em?
Thorns and brambles o’ergrow the countless hamlets.
True enough, strong women wield a hoe, steer a plough
raise crops, but fields wax all willy–nilly
while we Qin grunts contest battles bitter
driven ever on. We’re dogs and Langshans.
Yet one two–toothed venerable vexed me thus:

Durst thou, a soldier, carp and whine?
Even though it’s winter
hostile troops flood in through Western Pass.
The ravenous magistrate rapes us by tax tax tax.
We can’t shell out another dime. We’re broke.
We know now to birth a boy means grief
birthing girls is good. At least
they can be married to a neighbour.
Sons on sons rot beneath the sod.

Hast thou seen on the border of Qinghai
the heap o’ bleached bones all unheralded?
Old ghosts weep. Wrongs drive new to rage.
Rain from dark heaven teems on their howlings.