Lake Song

Softer than satin, warmer than May
Meanders through the mountains, flows towards the sea
Floods, precipitates, where the spirit meets the bones
Wondrous myths keep emerging
She makes a cast of words

She can mirror every hue, but all stories in blue
She is the tear of White Snake and Xu Xian
She is the homesickness of Princess Wencheng
She is the mystery of the Loch Ness monster
She is the tragedy of Siegfried and Odette's love

She is Hans's elegy against class marriage
She is Leviathan's dying farewell to the natural soul
She is the longing of Kuafu as he chases the sun
She is the loneliness of Momoi's bitterness towards beauty
She is the memory of the Korean War with all its dead and wounded

She can be a glimpse of relief, lullaby for the dark nights
She gives Peter Rabbit a wonderland
She measures the depth of Thoreau's nature
She preserves the shyness left by the fairy
She conveys what all ancient poets miss from afar

Stringing together strange resonances
With the swish, the gurgle, the ripple
As folklores are passed on
Taylor said "take her to the lake where all the poets went to die"
I will set off, too, on the beckoning journey, to find my muse
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