‘July 20, 1999’: A Poem by Daniel Magdalen

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July 20, 1999

a villanelle for Falun Gong Practitioners
after 24 years of persecution

Your path is narrow, yet look at where it goes
As you seek truth and truth defines your ways;
The land of bliss waits past the swamp of woes.

When rancid scorn and thorns are what life blows
Your way, you smell each rose and lift your gaze—
Your path is narrow, yet look at where it goes.

You’ve won each fight without a fight. Your foes
Are foes because they chose so, in a daze.
The land of bliss waits past the swamp of woes.

Your heart, vast as the sea, now overflows
And drowns in kindness mass state-sponsored craze.
Your path is narrow. Yet look at where it goes…

When tied and beaten down, each time you rose
And though your flesh may pass, your message stays—
The land of bliss waits past the swamp of woes.

Blows hurt your souls like rocks the cyclops throws
But cannot stop your homebound ship… We praise:
Your path is narrow, yet look at where it goes,
The land of bliss waits past the swamp of woes!

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Daniel Magdalen is a doctoral student in the Faculty of Letters at the University of Bucharest, in Romania.