The HyperTexts
Ho Xuan Huong English Translations by Michael R. Burch
Ho Xuan Huong (1772-1882) was a risqué Vietnamese poetess. Her verse, replete with nods, winks, sexual innuendo and a rich eroticism, was shocking to many readers of her day and will probably remain so
to some of ours. Huong has been described as "the candid voice of a liberal female in a male-dominated society." Her output has been called "coy, often bawdy lyrics."
I would add "suggestive to graphic." More information about this provocative poet follows these modern English translations of her poems.
Ốc Nhồi ("The Snail")
by
Ho Xuan Huong
loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch
My parents produced a snail,
Night and day it slithers through slimy grass.
If you love me, remove my shell,
But please don't jiggle my little hole!
The Breadfruit or Jackfruit
by Ho Xuan Huong
loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch
My body's like a breadfruit ripening on a tree:
My skin coarse, my pulp thick.
My lord, if you want me, pierce me with your stick,
But please don't squeeze or the sap will sully your fingers!
Bánh trôi nước ("Floating Sweet Dumpling")
by
Ho Xuan Huong
loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch
My powdered body is white and round.
Now I bob. Now I sink.
The hand that kneads me may be rough,
But my heart at the center remains untouched.
The Cake That Drifts In Water
by Ho Xuan Huong
loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch
I was born virginal and beautiful,
Yet my life's been full of struggles.
My fate rests entirely in the hands of the elites.
Yet still I shall keep my heart pure.
Ode to a Paper Fan
by Ho Xuan Huong
loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch
One ring receptive enough for any rod,
Coyly alluring since ancient times…
Your employment is to cool down sweating heroes,
To cover gentlemen’s heads whenever it rains.
Behind the bed-curtain, let’s tenderly ask him:
Panting like a dog in heat, are you satisfied?
Screw You!
by Ho Xuan Huong
loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch
Screw the rule that makes you share a man!
You slave like maids but without pay.
Unplanned Pregnancy
by Ho Xuan Huong
loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch
My yielding resulted in this chaos;
Who can understand my anguish? …
However, this love-load I’ll soon be lugging,
Despite the world’s condemnation
(To have child, without a husband)
Is a an exceptional feat!
The Unfortunate Plight of Women
by Ho Xuan Huong
loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch
Hey sisters, do you know?
The baby bawls at your breast
While your husband slides onto your stomach.
Both demanding your attention,
Both endlessly tugging.
All must be put in order.
“Hurry up with the flowers!”
Such are the demands of husbands and children.
Hey sisters, do you know?
Questions for the Moon
by Ho Xuan Huong
loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch
How many eons have you been there,
Endlessly transposing from slender to pregnant? …
Why do you orbit, aloof, the loneliness of night,
yet blush — so pale! — when seen by the sun?
Awake, long past midnight, whom do you seek?
Why so enchanted with hills, rivers and dales?
At the Chinese General's Tomb
by Ho Xuan Huong
loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch
I see it there — looming, alone —
the General's tomb, so impressive!
But if I could be reborn, become a man,
with such advantages, couldn't I do better?
Advice to a Lamenting Widow
by Ho Xuan Huong
loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch
Why are you wailing, boo-hoo-ing, mourning a man?
Can it sister! Desist! Don't shame yourself!
O my ear sister, I should have warned you:
Don't eat meat, if it makes you vomit blood!
Wasps
by Ho Xuan Huong
loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch
Where and why are you wandering, foolish wasps?
Come, your big sister will teach you to compose!
Silly baby wasps suckle from rotting stamens;
Horny ewes butt fences when there’s freedom in the gaps.
Lament for Hô Xuân Huong
by Nguyen Emperor Thieu Tri's brother
loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch
Here the lake overflows with lotuses;
Allow the flower girls to gather some,
While not trampling Hô Xuân Huong's grave!
For in the Golden Springs beyond,
She still anguishes over lost love.
Her lipstick desiccate, her rouge faded, her tomb unattended,
Xuân Huong is gone…
Most of Huong's poems were written in Nôm script, a complex Vietnamese
adaptation of Chinese characters employed from the 15th to 19th centuries.
Through her Nôm poems, Huong helped elevate the status of Vietnamese poetry. A
century later, she was called "the Queen of Nôm poetry" by Xuan Dieu, one of
Vietnam’s greatest poets.
Huong was more than a mere penner of erotic verse; she was an "outspoken
proto-feminist: an irreverent wild card bringing a new voice to Vietnamese
poetry while marking out a bolder trail for what it means to be a woman."
"Ho Xuan Huong is an improbable figure in Vietnamese literature. Vietnamese
historians are virtually unanimous in acclaiming her as the 'most special '
poetry writer who ever lived in Vietnam. … She wrote poetry which, for all its
playfulness, may have been the darkest assault upon Confucian ethics ever
delivered by a literate scholar of a classical East Asian society. Most modern
Vietnamese writers agree that she often went too far, to the point where her
contemporaries regarded her as a 'monster ' whose influence should be
obliterated. — Alexander Woodside, Vietnam and the Chinese Model
Confucian ethics decreed that a female should obey: first her father, then
her husband, then her son after her husband’s death.
Huong was apparently born in the Quynh Luu district of the north-central
province of Nghe An. Xuan Huong means "Spring Fragrance," "Spring Essence," or
"Scent of Springtime." Her father, a scholar named Ho Phi Dien, died young. Her
mother remarried, as a concubine. Huong grew up near Thang Long (modern Ha Noi),
in a male-dominated society in which polygamy was permitted and men were more
privileged than women. Huong may or may not have been a concubine herself. Very
little is known with any certainty about her life.
In 1962, Nguyễn Đức Bính admitted, "I don't know anything about the poetess Hồ
Xuân Hương and other people don't know any more than I do." And yet legends do
take on lives of their own!
Keywords/Tags: Ho Xuan Huong, Vietnamese, English translations, snail, grass,
shell, hole, breadfruit, jackfruit, tree, skin, hands, sap, stain, dumpling,
body, powder, powdered, sink, bob, swim, pond, heart, center, red, nom script,
spring fragrance, spring essence, concubine
Michael R. Burch Main Translation Page & Index:
The Best Poetry Translations of Michael R. Burch
The Best Poetry Translations of Michael R. Burch (sans links)
Translation Pages by Language:
Modern English Translations of Anglo-Saxon Poems by Michael R. Burch
Modern English Translations of Middle English and Medieval Poems
English Translations of Chinese Poets by Michael R. Burch
English Translations of Female Chinese Poets by Michael R. Burch
English Translations of French Poets by Michael R. Burch
Germane Germans: English Translations by Michael R. Burch
English Translations of German Poets by Michael R. Burch
English Translations of Japanese Poets by Michael R. Burch
English Translations of Japanese Zen Death Poems
English Translations of Ancient Mayan Love Poems
English Translations of Native American Poems, Proverbs and Blessings
English Translations of Roman, Latin and Italian Poets by Michael R. Burch
English Translations of Tamil Poets
English Translations of Urdu Poets by Michael R. Burch
English Translations of Uyghur Poets by Michael R. Burch
Translation Pages in Roughly Chronological Order:
Enheduanna (circa 2285 BC) the first poet we know by name
The Love Song of Shu-Sin: The Earth's Oldest Love Poem?
Ancient Egyptian Harper's Songs
Ancient Japanese Waka and Haiku
Ancient Greek Epigrams and Epitaphs
Sappho of Lesbos (circa 600 BC) Longer Poems
Sappho of Lesbos Shorter Poems and Fragments
Pindar (500 BC)
Antipater of Sidon (circa 150 BC)
Catullus (circa 50 BC)
Ovid (circa 10 AD)
Sulpicia Translations (circa 100 AD)
Martial Translations (circa 100 AD)
Song of Amergin (?) possibly the oldest poem from the English isles
Anglo-Saxon Poems
Anglo-Saxon Riddles and Kennings
Medieval Poetry Translations (658-1486)
Caedmon's Hymn (circa 658 AD) the oldest extant English poem
Bede's Death Song (circa 735 AD)
Ono no Komachi (circa 850 AD)
Deor's Lament (circa 890 AD)
Wulf and Eadwacer (circa 950 AD)
The Wife's Lament (circa 950 AD)
The Husband's Message (circa 950 AD)
The Ruin (circa 950 AD)
The Seafarer (circa 950 AD)
The Rhyming Poem (circa 950 AD)
Now skruketh rose and lylie flour (circa 1000 AD) is an early English rhyming poem
Middle English Poems
How Long the Night (circa 1200 AD)
Ballads
Sumer is Icumen in (circa 1250 AD)
Fowles in the Frith (circa 1250 AD)
Ich am of Irlaunde (circa 1250 AD)
Now Goeth Sun Under Wood (circa 1250 AD)
Pity Mary (circa 1250 AD)
Urdu Poetry (1253-present)
Amir Khusrow (1253-1325)
Dante (circa 1300 AD)
This World's Joy (circa 1300 AD)
Adam Lay Ybounden (circa 1400 AD)
Geoffrey Chaucer (circa 1400 AD)
I Have a Yong Suster (circa 1430 AD)
Charles d'Orleans (circa 1450 AD)
Leonardo da Vinci (1452-1519)
MICHELANGELO (1475-1564)
Sweet Rose of Virtue (circa 1500 AD)
Lament for the Makaris (circa 1500 AD)
Whoso List to Hunt (1503-1542)
Tom O'Bedlam's Song (circa 1600 AD)
Angelus Silesius (1624-1677)
Matsuo Basho (1644-1694)
Fukuda Chiyo-ni (1703-1775)
Yosa Buson (1716-1764)
Thomas Chatterton (1752-1769) the first English Romantic poet
Kobayashi Issa (1763-1828)
Ho Xuan Huong
(1772-1882)
Mirza Ghalib (1797-1869)
Tegner's Drapa (1820)
Charles Baudelaire (1821-1867)
Paul Verlaine (1844-1896)
Arthur Rimbaud (1854-1891)
Rabindranath Tagore (1861-1941)
Renée Vivien (1877-1909)
Allama Iqbal (1877-1938)
Miryam (Miriam) Ulinover (1888-1944)
Ber Horvitz (1895-1942)
Federico Garcia Lorca (1898-1936)
Bertolt Brecht (1898-1956)
Pablo Neruda (1904-1973)
Miklós Radnót (1909-1944)
Wladyslaw Szlengel (1914-1943)
Fadwa Tuqan (1917-2003)
Primo Levi (1919-1987)
Paul Celan (1920-1970)
Kamal Nasser (1924-1973)
Chaya Feldman (1926-1943)
Jaun Elia (1931-2002)
Ahmad Faraz (1931-2008)
Gulzar (1934-)
Mahmoud Darwish (1941-2008)
Nakba (1958-)
Vera Pavlova (1963-)
The following are links to other translations by Michael R. Burch:
Fukuda Chiyo-ni
Veronica Franco
Hafez
Rumi
Rahat Indori
Nasir Kazmi
Eihei Dogen Kigen
Meleager
Masters of Haiku
Rainer Maria Rilke
Alexander Pushkin's tender, touching poem "I Love You"
The Roses of Pieria
Sandor Marai
Takaha Shugyo
Saul Tchernichovsky
Marina Tsvetaeva
Robert Burns: Original Poems and Translations
The Seventh Romantic: Robert Burns
Uncredited Translations by Michael R. Burch
The following are links to other Michael R. Burch poetry pages:
Poetry by Michael R. Burch
Free Love Poems by Michael R. Burch
My Influences by Michael R. Burch
Michael R. Burch Early Poems Timeline
Bemused by Muses
Poems for Poets
Timeline of Rhyme
Michael R. Burch Free Verse
The Best Poetry Translations of Michael R. Burch
Best Poetry Translations sans links
The HyperTexts