Flutes mourn on the city wall. It is dusk:
the last birds cross our village graveyard,

and after decades of battle, their war-tax
taken, people return in deepening night.

Trees darken against cliffs. Leaves fall.
The river of stars faintly skirting beyond

frontier passes, I gaze at a tilting Dipper,
the moon thin, magpies done with flight.

translated by David Hinton