Luo Yijun — The Story of Abandonment (English Translation)

Published on Tue Feb 17 2026 11:57:15 GMT-0800 (北美太平洋标准时间)

The Story of Abandonment, from the poetry collection of the same name 棄的故事 by Luo Yijun 駱以軍, 1995, Taiwan

Translated by Mu Layla, 2025

The Story of Abandonment

If
Abandonment is no longer me
Like life’s indifferent valley where echoes are angrily tossed and left
Or a family name
A brand-like record from the vaginal kiss of a mother’s womb
Thus there is no need for us to adamantly struggle
The winter of that year
In the end, it’s your (1) abandonment that was my banishment
On the border between poetry and dejection
Or perhaps an affirmation of poetry and dejection
I, abandon you.
The winter of that year
I obsessively till the soil, obsessively plant
In the wilderness of poetry and dejection
Uncaring of the all-encompassing snowstorm
Frantic
Dying with my blazing, scalding beard and withering cheeks
Cadaver falling gracefully by the beauty of tears
Final-month offerings in the deep snow
I poorly hum folk-songs day and night
Treading barefoot
Frost nipping away at the legumes and the wild coffee flowers’ tips (2)
Imitating the obscene dances of the great spirit
The distant father
“I am a virgin and a footprint’s illegitimate child
Born on the third day,
My mother abandoned me in a narrow alleyway,
Ignored by the horses and oxes;
My mother abandoned me in the canals of ice
The birds avert their eyes covered with wings.
If abandonment is a form of disposition,
I decide to curl up, close myself off in my mother’s womb
Disposition
A way of leaving one’s self behind.
The record of the dispositions that have been passed and those that are being passed
Those who are abandoned the most,
Really are those who are most greedy,
Trying to sneak on memories
Expanding the domain of poetry.”
The distant father
I saw him, face covered, in dejection, sitting.
Before the footprints of chaos and disorder came
“Why have you abandoned me?”
Delivering the distant echo
I asked my mother
My mother asked my father
You(1) asked me
“Abandonment is a footprint
Because I know
You will love the footprint more
Than you love my ankles”
The winter of that year
I planted you(1) amongst the school’s weedy wilderness
Not staying for your budding
Dancing with the obscene dances of the great spirit
Shivering, I left
“If you(1) were abandoned by me in the snowy wilderness
Then please remember
Abandonment is my intense, burning kiss
It’s me
The gestures of my love will gnaw at you your entire life, its spirit will not disappear.”
“Who, in the end, are you?”
“I am abandonment.”

(1) This second person pronoun, this “you” is specifically addressed to a feminine target.
(2) Psychotria rubra, plant native to the China mainland (Zhejiang, Fujian, Hunan, Guangdong, Hainan, Guangxi, Guizhou, Yunnan), Hong Kong, and Taiwan, which grows on the plains and hillsides, in the underbrush near creeks, and amidst the forests (https://db.kib.ac.cn/CNFlora/SearchResult.aspx?cpni=CPNI-078-45982)