by Yuan Changming
With their most tender touches, snowflakes
Have painted the whole night white
Including the darkest corner in sight
Even within a forgotten dream
Except the plum tree, standing alone there
Under the eastern sky, whose
Flowers are blooming boldly against
The entire season, more vibrant than blood
***
photo credit: Georg Eiermann, Unsplash
Yuan Changming, 12-time Pushcart nominee and multiple prize winner, is probably the world’s most widely published contemporary poetry author who speaks Mandarin but writes in English. Growing up in a remote Chinese village, Yuan started to learn the English alphabet in Shanghai at age nineteen and published several monographs on translation before moving to Canada as an international student. With a PhD in English from the University of Saskatchewan, Yuan currently lives in Vancouver, where he edits Poetry Pacific with Allen Qing Yuan. Since mid-2005, Yuan has had poetry appearing in more than 2,000 literary journals/anthologies, across 49 countries, which include Best Canadian Poetry (2009, 2012, 2014), the Best of the Best Canadian Poetry: Tenth Anniversary Edition (2008-17), BestNewPoemsOnline and Poetry Daily. In 2021 he was nominated, and served on the jury, for Canada’s National Magazine Awards (poetry category). Early in 2022, Yuan began writing and publishing fiction, with his first novel Mabakoola forthcoming in 2024.