Showing posts with label persuasion. Show all posts
Showing posts with label persuasion. Show all posts

Sunday 16 March 2008

某些领导


身体越来越胖心胸越来越窄,
头衔越来越多学问越来越浅,
讲话越来越长真话越来越少,
权力越来越大威信越来越低,
年纪越来越老情人越来越小。


This is the only poem I've got into since I've been in China. On reading it for the first time I put down my mobile and stared out the taxi for a while. I think its more about power than a specific country or its officials, but what do I know?.... It was written in Chinese and perhaps the translation may have skipped some nuance? Or even a localised version of iambic pentameter. Either way I'm planet before country when it comes to nationalism. It's a logic thing really; entirely selfish I guess.

Here's the translation

Sketch of Officials

The body grows fat and fatter, the heart narrower and narrower
The titles accumulate more and more, the knowledge shallower and shallower,
The speeches longer and longer, the truths fewer and fewer,
The power greater and greater, the authority lower and lower,
The age older and older, the mistresses younger and younger.