The New Yorker: The Book Bench (online): A Writing Chance

A Writing Chance
The Book Bench, The New Yorker (online), May 19, 2008

In protest of human-rights violations in China leading up to the Beijing Olympics, International PEN is conducting its own Olympic relay, with a poem in place of the iconic torch. The poem, “June,” by Shi Tao, an imprisoned Chinese journalist, addresses the 1989 protests in Tiananmen Square, but ends with an image eeriely evocative of the recent earthquake in Sichuan province:

June, the earth shifts, the rivers fall silent
Piled up letters unable to be delivered to the dead

As the poem circles the globe (via the Internet), it is being translated into local languages (ninety thus far, including Kurdish, Náhuatl, and Darug). Recordings from different countries are posted on the relay Web site, where you can track the poem’s progress on a map and read about other imprisoned writers. This month, the poem is travelling through China; it is scheduled to arrive in Tibet on June 2nd.—Jenna Krajeski

http://www.newyorker.com/online/blogs/books/?xrail

Re-posted on:

Mahler's Prodigal Son (blog): http://mahlersprodigalson.blogspot.com/
Schadenbasel (blog): http://combatingcraziness.blogspot.com/2008/05/earth-shifts-rivers-fall-silent.html