Moonlight in Mourning of Someone
.
An eyewitness recounts: “At the beginning I was simply stunned by
what he was doing, when I saw him walking above the tips of silver-
grass swaying in the breeze, wondering if he wasn’t indeed Bodhi-
dharma! He raised his cane high, shoved both of his arms outward
and hard, as if he were roaring; maybe he thought he was Moses
parting the Red Sea. Though the stream was shallow, there were
caverns left by illegal excavations. But I didn’t hear any sound of
water; it was early morning on the sixteenth day of the month, the
moon was especially full, the sky was very blue, so there was no
reason why he could not reach the other shore.”
what he was doing, when I saw him walking above the tips of silver-
grass swaying in the breeze, wondering if he wasn’t indeed Bodhi-
dharma! He raised his cane high, shoved both of his arms outward
and hard, as if he were roaring; maybe he thought he was Moses
parting the Red Sea. Though the stream was shallow, there were
caverns left by illegal excavations. But I didn’t hear any sound of
water; it was early morning on the sixteenth day of the month, the
moon was especially full, the sky was very blue, so there was no
reason why he could not reach the other shore.”
Neither his clothes nor even his shoes were wet. According to the
autopsy report, he was drowned by moonlight.
.
by Shang Qin
translation: 2005, Michelle Yeh
