For James Joyce
How quickly Han-Shan has forgotten
His address. The street is the right
Street, running along the hillside,
But where among the huddled houses
Of the government suburb
Is the one he calls home?
Snow has begun to fall.
“White houses,” Han-Shan reflects,
“Lose their identity in general
Albescence.”
Even the serrated peaks
That compose the Mountain
Are growing nameless now
In the democracy of snow.
“Where in all that generality
Is Littlejohn Knob?” Han-Shan wonders.
He inquires direction of a man
Who waits, shovel at rest
For the increase of tumbling flakes.
The stranger answers question
With question. “How long have you
Lived here?” he asks.
“Isn’t this a bit too early for snow?”
Angrily, Han-Shan thinks,
“We’re two old ronyons playing
At non-sequiturs in a snowstorm.”
But he answers civilly:
“In a new country, one learns
To temper the wind to the shorn lamb,”
Hardly knowing what his grandmother
Had meant, he is so cold.
Thanking the stranger for what
Information has passed between them,
Han-Shan plods on, upslope, downslope.
Where, in all that whiteness
Is his little white house
With its swept porch and yellow
Summer chairs, object of amusement
To his remarking neighbors.
Where is the ancient tulip tree
In the front yard? Where, behind
The saffron door, are the warm
Book-lined room and the picture
Of Shi-te as a young man? Where
The bronzed Greek youths hurling
Discuses from the fireboard?
Tiring, he eases himself
Groundward by the roadside, resting
His head on his bent knees, and waits.
Some passerby would surely find him there
And guide him upmountain before dark.
Everywhere about him, in silver
And dark flakes, the snow is falling
On the road, on the rocks, on the trees:
All the sceneries of familiar earth,
Making them strange and untenable.
Snow is falling too on the lonely
Hill where Shi-te lies buried.
Han-Shan hears the snow falling faintly
Throughout the universe.
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