China’s sun
Shed tears.
The tears
Fell on the clouds.
They listened to lullabies
Day and night,
Sung by their parents,
The Sun and Moon.
A tear of sunlight,
Listens to the voices
Of Gods in heaven,
And it longed for
Immortality.
The tear transformed itself,
Into another creature,
For it had faith
The travel for immortality
Could be suceeded.
Journeys to the west,
The creature searched endlessly,
And found a tree of
Good and evil.
The creature lay wearily,
Under the ancient tree’s canopy.
An aura of spirits,
Good and evil
Revealed their souls
Under the misty moonlight.
The tear dreamt of hell,
A place of havoc,
Where demons dwelled.
It found itself
Standing forefront
Of an endless wall.
On the wall,
The creature’s name
Shone invitingly under
The funereal darkness.
The tear walked closer,
And closer,
Close enough
To cross its name off
The registry of death.
But the wall of death
Pulled the tear back
Like an irrepressible puppet,
Forcing it to write its name
Back on the wall.
The tear dreamt of heaven,
Where the Gods lived,
Finding a magical book
Of the immortals.
It opened the book,
And wrote its name in secret.
Its success was wronged,
As its name faded
In a matter of seconds.
Armies of warriors,
Creatures armed with countless weapons
Stormed in heaven’s direction,
Fighting for the chance
Of immortality.
A monkey landed on the clouds,
From nowhere
And battled all armies
With his seventy-two
Different transformations.
The monkey wrote
Its name on the book,
But its name faded.
The monkey raged,
Awakening the Gods
To discover the
Millions of trespassers.
With a single spell,
It forced all
Creatures back to
The earth
Where mortals dwelled.
Journeys to The West,
All dreams are possible,
Except immortality.
The tear of sunlight
Now awakens,
With the discovery
That immortality was impossible.
But it continued
To dream more
Journeys to the West,
For there are countless places
Yet to be explored.
C. H.
Search for Immortality was shortlisted for the 2018 Hong Kong Young Writers Awards.
