Summer Is Still Very Far Away -- Bai Hua

(Poem #215)Summer Is Still Very Far Away One day passes after another  Secretly, something approaches you  Sitting, walking  Watching the leaves drop  Watching the rain fall  Watching as someone walks down the street  Summer is still very far away It happened so fast, vanishing at birth  All that is good entered on an October night  So beautiful, entirely unnoticed  A great serenity like your clean cloth shoes  The past, vague and gentle, lingers by the bedside  Like an old box  A faded bookmark  Summer is still very far away Meeting by chance, perhaps you can't recall  It was a little cold outside  Your left hand was tired, too  Secretly you walked all the way to the left  Far away, deep in  The sole infatuation of your heart  Summer is still very far away Never again easy to anger, easy to love  To take up those old bad habits of yours  Losing heart with each passing year  A small bamboo house, a white shirt  Are you in the prime of life?  Seldom can a decision be made  Summer is still very far away -- Bai Hua