(The Opening Verses) — Modern English Adaptation

A crystal willow, a poplar made of water,
a tall fountain bending beneath the wind,
a tree with deep roots that never stops dancing,
a river that twists and keeps moving,
turning back on itself only to begin again,
always arriving.

The quiet journey
of the stars, or of a slow spring,
water rising with closed eyes,
speaking its prophecies through the night,
one presence becoming countless waves,
one wave after another until nothing remains outside them,
an endless kingdom of green,
like wings suddenly opening across the sky.

A path through the wilderness of days still to come,
the dark beauty of sorrow like a bird
whose song can turn an entire forest into stone,
the joys waiting just ahead, then disappearing among the branches,
the bright hours pecked away by birds,
the signs we almost catch but never hold,
a sudden presence breaking open like music,
like the wind singing inside a burning house,
a single glance that gathers the whole world—
its seas, its mountains—
suspended in the air.

A body woven from light passing through agate,
thighs of light, a belly of light, hidden bays,
a sunlit cliff, a body colored like clouds,
the color of a fresh day leaping into life.
The hour itself shines
as though time had taken on a body.

The world becomes visible through your body,
clear because you are transparent.
I walk through halls of sound,
moving among voices and echoes.

I pass through layers of light as though I were blind.
One reflection erases me; another gives me birth.
O enchanted forest of columns,
through arches of light I travel
into corridors where everything seems weightless.

I travel through your body
as though I were traveling through the world.
Your belly is a sunlit square.
Your breasts are two temples
where blood performs its own quiet rituals.
My gaze climbs over you like ivy.

You are a city under siege by the sea,
walls split open by light,
their halves glowing like ripe peaches;
a kingdom of salt, stone, and birds,
ruled by the forgetfulness of noon.

You wear the color of my longing.
You move naked
like my own thoughts.
I travel through your eyes as though crossing the sea.
Tigers come there to drink their dreams.
A hummingbird burns in their fire.

I travel across your forehead
like the moon,
like a cloud drifting through your thoughts.
I travel through your belly
the way I wander through your dreams.
Your skirt of corn ripples and sings,
your skirt of crystal,
your skirt of water.

Your lips, your hair, your eyes
rain over me through the night
and through the day.
With fingers made of water
you open my chest.
With your mouth of water
you close my eyes.
You rain into my bones,
a tree of living water
sending its roots deep into my heart...