Why should I not go home? It is so late
If I return to beautiful Khorranmabad
I shall find people of my own benevolent race
Washing clothes by the brook even at twilight.
Will the be humming a merry tune
Or laughing, chattering about domestic trifles?
The water will surely run passing our door
And under the dim indigo lamp.
My white-haired mother
Will be hurriedly weaving a gorgeous carpet ─
Take a rest, will you?
The bread baked in the morning is now cold
And it is past supper time.
Let my little sister have some cheese
She’s so thin, pale and forlorn,
I have promised to take her to the market
To sell the carpets so as to buy her a red flowery skirt.
Why aren’ you in bed, Mother?
Tomorrow you’ll have to carry water home on your head in the copper tank
And knead the wheat flour into pancakes.

Let the endless weaving be.
Even though I did say
I’d return when the carpet was finished
When you miss me in the night, please don’t raise your head ─
I heard this is the season of meteors faling.
Tonight night will fall more rapidly
And if Little Sister won’t go to bed. tell her
Her dlder brother, Elder Brother, will soon be back ….

Why should I not go home? It is so late.
If I return to beautiful Khorramabad

I shall find people of my own benevolent race ─
My aged mother and my forlorn sister
(Ready)
This parting from you
(Fire)
Ends all parting from you

　　　選自Andrew Parkin (edited). From the Bluest Part of the Harbour.
　　　Hong Kong, Oxford, and New york Oxford University Press, 1995.
Shatin, 18 March 1985