Friday, January 26, 2007

Kashgar's Desert Willow 喀什葛爾胡楊

Song & lyrics by Dao Lang (click on title)
Arrangement by Mac Chew

From the beginning, I never considered where
in my heart you should be placed.
From the beginning, you called to my imaginations.
At that moment when I was about to give you a special place there,
You had forgotten me already,
I, in turn, had to look hard and deep into my memory
for every little bit of our love,
hoping that your heart would turn to me again.
You told me that " 'Till death do us part" means one's entire lifetime,
and you would not give it up for me.

I felt that I should find other ways to see you,
yet fear that we shall never be together.
I'm willing to wait until our next life,
when we'll hold each other in our arms,
and you'll renew your love for me.

I will silently pray that when Heaven remakes this world
to pay you special attention so that your appearance will not be altered,
Then no matter in however impoverished a village or however noisy a city,
I'll see you and recognize you immediately.

Let me wander through this earth for three thousand years,
and grow as old as the Kashgar desert willow.

I will search carefully for you for centuries onwards,
and find you in any reincarnated form.
I do not fear the gusting of the wind,
nor the thrashing of the rain,
nor the burning under the sun,
nor any harm this sandy desert may do me;
I'll lay down my heart and my love plainly for you to see.
I would that my body be eroded over the ages by the wind,
and hope that then, you'll feel my true love.

Our love stopped in this century,
from the moment we arrived to the moment we left.
What landscape has it transformed into?
Our love is hidden under the soil, which has made it suffer so,
and become such a lament.

Kashgar page on Wikipedia
Desert Willow (Huyang) on Wikipedia in Chinese only

2 comments:

Unknown said...

I think this stanza needs to be reworked, because it's awkward:

"Let me grow 3 thousand years old wandering through this world,
So far even that should I turn into a Kashgar desert willow."

Otherwise, seems like a pretty good translation because it's written in fairly natural but correct English.

Unknown said...

Thanks for the suggestion. It's been revised.