Two Poems by Hsu Pei-Fen Translated by Jonathan Pyner

Jordan Road, Hong Kong

In a room at a small hotel on Jordan Road,
you press into me, face red and out of breath.
I lie, tell you, you got it, you don’t need
to fight so hard, you can slow down,
you are liberated, you are free.

Slow down, don’t tie me up tonight,
don’t pull my panties down to my ankles—
in the revolution we are both virgins,
a drop of blood splashes on the wall,
a poem executed by firing squad.

You’re too violent, I say,
but anyone can tell I’m not really complaining—
the erotic is the gaze beneath the mask,
the erotic is subversive,
the speech that threatens empires.

People busy crying on the street,
a meteor shower befalls Jordan Road.
We forget to make a wish.
You say, with all the light pollution
filling our cage, better
to close the curtains.

〈佐敦道〉	(“Jordan Road, Hong Kong”)

你在佐敦道上小酒店的房裡壓著
我，在你身下臉紅氣喘的
說謊：加油、光復
自由，你不要
那麼大力
不要那麼快

慢一點，今晚不要捆綁我
把內褲脫到腳踝
在革命面前我們都是處子
一滴血濺到牆上
一首詩中槍

你太暴力了，我說
然而誰都知道這不是真的在抱怨
色情是面具下的眼
色情是知其不可為
人言可畏

佐敦道上下起流星雨
街上的人忙著流淚
忘了許願
你說只要拉上窗簾
光害就進不來
我們的牢

In My Next Life

In my next life, I hope
to be reborn as a beautiful deer,
to renew your grief near a wood
where you drive and collide
with the guardrail.
 
In my next life, I want to reincarnate
as a snail with brittle shell. After rain,
crossing the road, I will shatter
willingly under your footstep and live 
on the bottom of your shoe
following you wherever you go.

In my next life,
I want to become 
a misprinted word, 
to blemish the perfect love poem,
to surprise you a little,
make you contemplate
the meaning of my existence.

〈下輩子〉	(“In My Next Life”) 

我要用自己的下輩子
投胎成一隻美麗的鹿
在你駛車時衝上路肩
換得你誠懇的哀慟

我要用自己的下輩子
轉世成一隻嬌小的蝸牛
在雨後的馬路上
靜靜地被你踩碎
就可以住在你的鞋底
跟你到任何地方去

下輩子
我要變成一枚
印錯的字
錯降在一首
完美的情詩裏
讓你微微詫異
讓你認真思考
我存在的意義

Hsu Pei-Fen (b. 1986) is a Taiwanese poet and writer. Originally from Hualien, Hsu has received numerous literary accolades, including the Lin Rong-San Literature Award, the Chou Meng-Tieh Poetry Award, and a literary grant from the National Culture and Arts Foundation. In 2019, she completed the Artist-in-Residence Program at the Vermont Studio Center, USA; in 2022, she served as a writer-in-residence at National Sun Yat-sen University, Taiwan. In 2024, she helped curate the Taipei City Bus and MRT Quarterly Poetry and Prose Selections (Season 3).

Hsu’s publications include poetry collections such as Still, Furniture Lifts Some of Live’s Sorrows (2015), I See My Own Eyes as I Gaze into the Black Hole (2016), I Only Worry if the Rain Will Last Until Tomorrow Morning (2017), Nocturnal Animals (2019), and The Number You Have Dialed for God is Disconnected (2024). She has also published the novel Goodnight, Candy House (2021), a translation of T.S. Eliot’s Old Possum’s Book of Practical Cats, and the film-adaptation novel Befriend (2018). Her poems have been included in Under the Same Roof: A Poetry Anthology for LGBTQ, New Century New Generation Poetry Collection, and The Best Taiwanese Poetry 2021: 40th Anniversary Edition. 

Jonathan Pyner was born in Napa Valley and graduated from the University of California, Berkeley, where he was a student-teacher poet in June Jordan’s Poetry for the People. He received his MFA in poetry and held a teaching fellowship at Hollins University in the Jackson Center for Creative Writing. He has lived in Taiwan since 2015, where he writes, translates, and teaches. An alumnus of the Community of Writers in Palisades, Tahoe, he has published original poems in Fourth River Journal, About Place Journal, Pacific International Poetry Festival Anthology (2022), TPC Review, and Taipei Poetry Collective’s Versify Zine. 

Specializing in Chinese-to-English poetry translation, he has translated work by Taiwanese poet Hsiao Yi-Hui for Hsiao’s feature in Brooklyn Rail’s “A Cyan Afternoon” reading, as well as contributed translations of Chinese children’s poetry for an upcoming anthology edited by Chinese poet Lan Lan. 

31 December 2025