The Beginning of spring

One blossom after another,

One after another is plucked—yet never exhausted.

The hibiscus takes the spring as its backing.

Christine Chen, an award-winner writer and poet from New Zealand shares her poetry

Christine Chen, a New Zealand writer, poet, translator, and newspaper editor, won the prestigious 30th Italian Ossi di Seppia Award for Best Foreign Writer in 2023. Her works have been translated into nearly 20 languages and are housed in esteemed institutions such as the Royal Library of Belgium and the University of Rome. She currently serves as a committee member of the World Poetry Movement, the Oceania coordinator, an ambassador for the UN-registered Writer Capital International Foundation, and the President of Oceania for the International Chamber of Writers & Artists (CIESART). Her latest book, “Has the Flower Bloomed?” (Chinese-Italian), was published in January 2025.

Ode to spring

The Beginning of spring

One blossom after another,

One after another is plucked—yet never exhausted.

The hibiscus takes the spring as its backing.

 

Grass spreads endlessly, growing wild,

Taking the vast earth as its backing, unrestrained.

 

Birds, butterflies, and bees pour out from their nests,

Roaming the mountains and drifting through clouds,

Taking the sky as their backing, free and unbound.

 

Barefoot, I walk upon the hillside,

Spring light bursts forth—warblers fly, grass thrives……

All around are my backing.

Note

Lichun (The beginning of spring) is the first of the 24 solar terms in the lunar calendar, marking the beginning of a new year.

***

Gold and Stone Yield

(Written during the Lunar New Year of 2025)

For so many years,

I buried myself in books, bowed my head to write,

And set off on the road with my backpack.

Until, roads unfolded beneath my feet,

Words raced onto paper,

Golden houses slipped out of books

And settled onto my little plot of land—

Where beauty resides.

A boundless clear sky—

A bluebird carries away drifting clouds,

All the blues kneel before the lake at my door.

Water droplets pierce through stone,

And seeds swept along by the current

Bloom upon the rocks.

Oh, fate arrives unbidden—

Gold and stone yield, revealing

A brand-new spring!

***

To My Daughter

A new cycle turns,

The planet bathed in endless spring,

Mountains stretching far—

Life and death, ceaseless.

Step by step, we walk,

Into sunrise, toward sunset.

I climb high, you take your first steps,

I descend, you drift far away.

Our roles reverse.

You step into a fate neither good nor bad.

Dusk falls—

I can no longer see you clearly.

The river flows on,

Birds come and go with the spring.

From a child’s lips, ancestors’ names take flight—

Life and death, rise and fall,

Handed down.

Oh, my love, after a century of solitude,

You deliver an unyielding game.

____________  

Coordinated by Angela Kosta Executive Director of MIRIADE Magazine, Academic, journalist, writer, poet, essayist, literary critic, editor, translator, promoter