Terra Cotta Soldiers

Tell us, what's the matter with you, soldier?
When your heads were stepped over, you didn't even blink.
Thousands of hooves stamp by; yet you didn't even moan.
Have you lost that shout? Or the Dao has abandoned you?
Whatever happened to your battle cry?
What caused the erosion of the essence of the Yang in you?

When they unearthed you from under our feet
our collective jaw dropped to the ground, for we can't believe
They have you lined up like this for a couple of millennia
Silence is no longer gold
but the loudest battle cry that have never been heard

Sad but miraculous that through the corridor of time
you have somehow kept yourself alive
We see the resemblance and the familiar expression
of pride, of helplessness and of indifference
an expression that has eventually become us
Maybe we should thank the Chief Craftsman,
for his suffering kept you vivid for eternity

When he was a boy, learning his crafts
He hadn't got the slightest idea that someday
His genius and skills would become his demise
For his fame, the Imperial Court issued no invitation
Instead, they sent some bruising soldiers to capture him
He was made the Chief Craftsman to make clay soldiers
that will guard the emperor's tomb
a container of gigantic evil.
Clay simply because human body would rot
For the craftsman of great skills, there was no honor,
no proper decoration but a cruel threat:
"If you ever kill yourself in protest
Death will become your entire family,
your entire town, infant and elderly included"
From that day on soldiers dominated his life
A fact that no doubt contributed to his art pieces
and enriched the individuality in his creation
Thus you still line up to impress our eyes
We almost forgot that grand irony of centuries --
that art was the Chief Craftsman's lifelong spite

By now you probably have realized
why he made all of you lined up like this
and Whom or what you were supposed to protect
Maybe soldiers are supposed to be proud of their commander
The more terrible the tyrant the more respect you yield to him
The more cruel the emperor the more resounding the empire
Even when the tyrant is dead, thousands must accompany him
Into the underground
Into the world over where his power lingers on forever
Oh, everyone of you holds your chin up with dignity and glory
You would never shed a tear. You dare not
Tears can be so shameful for a soldier's dignity
Thus you remain strong but silent and empty
... for centuries ongoing

We tremble, an army of this magnitude possesses the purest Qi
The aura of virility permeated the air and scorched the land
The day when a peasant's well-drill reached you
A rainbow of myriads of colors shot up into our sky

Let's not forget, however, it is the empire
that ordered this creation died with your coming to form
And the grand burial of the emperor, the Chief Craftsman
and thousands of terra cotta soldiers
broke an ancient equilibrium on this bowl of yellow earth
Nobody knows how but this event actually gave birth
To the Tang, to the Song, and to the magnificent Glory of a people
a people of unprecedented suffering and genius
... and a couple of millennia later this fossilization of Yang
under the yellow earth eventually brought to your offsprings
the most spectacular humiliation on this planet

Ancient philosophies constructed by years of medication
were trashed by the emperor of our own barbarianism
and shunned by many of our simpleton kings and lords
Our poets were exiled to wild mountains
And since the burials of soldiers made of clay
Heroes are ????uted or cancelled each other out
Beauties were treated with cruelty and destruction
The humiliation is inevitable ...
... miracle is that we still live to the day
to see you being unearthed ...
Only now we feel that weakness in our knees
and maybe in some of our spines

Astonished, we came to grasp the sad fact
that we are the unfortunate children of you
the damned soldiers who died standing up
Our love for you has soured into a gigantic curse
We have no idea what this new phenomenon will bring to us
as you're being paraded around the globe
in museums and exhibition halls
How would we explain? Whenever we face you
A solitary soldier or an army of clay mummies,
both pride and shame are provoked in our heart
Like wild raging fire across the Gobi Desert
A fabulous congestion stuck up in our throat
We want to declare that we aren't no children of any damn soldier
The only link between you and us is this time eternal shame
Not only are you dumb and deaf, you also leave us with no choice
You are nothing but empty shells with eyes that could never focus.
The world has left you and is threatening to leave us as well

March, 2000