Translated by Ouyang Yu
at five in the morning, i can hear pigs shrieking
from across the river
i can imagine how a sharp knife
thrusts into the throat of a pig
and how the hot blood shining with a cold light
spurts out into the world relentlessly …
a new day, the things around me
— the trees, the birds as well as that small river
it is in this hair-and-bone terror that they wake up
Zhang Minhua is a judge and poet who works in Jiashan Court, Zhejiang Province, China.
About Ouyang Yu
Ouyang Yu is an award-winning poet, novelist and translator. His first novel,
The Eastern Slope Chronicle, won the 2004 South Australian Festival Award for Innovation in Writing. His third novel,
The English Class, won the 2011 NSW Premier's Award, and his 14th collection of poetry,
Terminally Poetic (2020), won the Judith Wright Calanthe Award for a Poetry Book in the 2021 Queensland Literary Awards. Recent works include the novels
All the Rivers Run South (Puncher and Wattmann, 2003) and
The Sun at Eight or Nine (Puncher and Wattmann, 2025), and the collection of short stories
The White Cockatoo Flower (Transit Lounge 2024).
Further reading:
