|
login
|
|
< back |
|
Luo Jiasheng
every day as the chimneys belch smoke
he comes riding to work on his old “Bell”-brand bicycle past the administration building past the forging shop past the perimeter wall of the storehouse to that small hut workers standing in workshop doorways say when they see him Luo Jiasheng’s here no one knows anything about him no one asks him anything about himself the whole factory calls him Luo Jiasheng the workers are always knocking on his door wanting their watches repaired electric meters repaired their radios repaired during the Cultural Revolution he was expelled from the factory: in a suitcase belonging to him someone had found a tie when he was allowed to come back to work he still rode that old “Bell” Luo Jiasheng got married without anyone knowing he invited no one to the wedding at the age of forty-two he became a father in the same year he died an electric furnace opened an enormous gash in his head it was shocking on the day of the funeral his wife did not attend a few workers carried his coffin up into the hills they said he was short he wasn’t heavy the watches he repaired were better than new the chimneys belch smoke workers stand in the workshop doorways Luo Jiasheng hasn’t come to work 1982 |
© 2000, Yu Jian From: Yu Jian de shi Publisher: Renmin wenxue chubanshe, Beijing, ISBN: 7 02 003328 8 |
© Translation: 2003, Simon Patton |