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THE AUTUMN WIND (based on the life and poetry of Qiu Jin) ~ ACT III

A Play in Three Acts.

By ZJC (2026)

Characters:

QIU JIN (30s) — Revolutionary, poet, swordswoman. She leaves her husband and children to change China. She will not succeed. She will be remembered.

WU ZHIYING (late 40s) — Poet, calligrapher, wife of a Qing official. She helps Qiu Jin escape to Japan. She loves her across distance and death.

XU ZIHUA (40s) — Widowed principal of Xunxi Girls' School. She hires Qiu Jin. She becomes Qiu Jin's partner, her sister, her gravedigger.

XU XILIN (30s) — Qiu Jin's cousin. Revolutionary. He recruits her into the Restoration Society. His failure causes her death.

THE STATE (Actor 5) — Messenger, Official, Executioner, Gulin. The face of the government that wants to erase her.

Setting: Beijing, Tokyo, Zhejiang, Shaoxing. 1903-1908. A single room that transforms — a writing desk, a tea table, a scroll on the wall, a willow branch when needed, a sword that appears and disappears.

Running Time: Approximately 90 minutes.

)(*)(

ACT THREE: THE ELEGY

SCENE 11: THE MADNESS OF WU ZHIYING

Setting: Wu Zhiying's house, Beijing. July 1907.

The same room as Act One. On the wall, a scroll of calligraphy: 安排嬌骨用鞭摑 — in Qiu Jin's handwriting. It would be droll if anyone was in the mood for such frivolous gestures.

But the room is a wreck. Dark. Curtains drawn. Table overturned. A broken tea set. A black mess where a pot of ink had been thrown against a wall in rage.

A single candle burns low — it has been burning for days.

Books, poems, papers are scattered on the floor. A life of letters has been dropped and not picked up.

WU ZHIYING sits on the floor. Hair undone. She does not move, staring at nothing. She has been here for days.

The candle flickers.

She mumbles — these are not words to be heard by anyone.

WU ZHIYING: "One life..."

(She stops.)

(She tries again.)

"One life..."

(She cannot finish.)

(She looks at the writing brush on the floor. She does not pick it up.)

(Blackout.)

(When the lights come on again time has passed. A couple of days — a thousand years, it is impossible to know.)

(Wu Zhiying has moved beyond grief into a new state — not mania, but she is a woman driven by a feverish goal that has consumed her.)

(But she is ill, gravely ill. A cup of untouched medicine sits on the floor. Cold. Forgotten. She stops once in a while to cough into a handkerchief. Perhaps not consumption, perhaps not blood in the lungs, but a dire illness.)

(Regardless, she sits at her table, now right side up, writing furiously.)

(Whatever sentiment that drove her to say, "I will stay here in this house pouring tea," in Act 1 has been forgotten.)

(The floor around her contains a thousand crumpled attempts at articulating her grief. At her elbow, a small mountain of papers have been stacked; she has been composing Qiu Jin's biography, writing eulogies, writing and writing and writing.)

(She stops. Puts down her brush with ink-stained fingers.)

(Silently reads her lines.)

(Rage at not writing the right words. In a fit she crumples the poem, tosses it aside. There is a horrible moment when she isn't in control. It passes. She takes a fresh sheet of paper and starts again.)

(She closes her eyes. Gathers her thoughts. A long pause.)

(She begins to write. Stops. Adds a thought and puts down the brush.)

(She stands. This should be an agonizing movement; she has been sitting for days, her body forgotten. She walks a little, trying to get the blood moving. She stands over her poem, looking down on it, casting judgment.)

(She picks up the paper and finally reads it out loud.)

WU ZHIYING: "One life, not preserved, / For millennia, a heroic name lives."

(At some earlier time she would have paused to enjoy such a powerful, creative success. Not today. She places the paper on top of the pile of finished work.)

(She sits. Picks up her brush and begins to write once more.)

(Blackness.)

(When the lights come up this time Wu Zhiying has transformed. She is still ill, still weak, but her hair is washed and her clothes clean. Her manuscripts organized into piles in front of her.)

(She speaks as she writes.)

WU ZHIYING (writing and coughing): To Xu Zihua, Principal of Xunxi Girls' School —

(She writes.)

You have suggested a burial site by West Lake. Xiling. The place Qiu Jin herself wanted.

(She writes.)

Already the government is speaking out against — (She finds she is about to write, "Brother Qiu," pauses and includes it.) Already there are rumors her body will be dug up, desecrated, as a warning to others. (She pauses, thinks.) The first priority is to secretly transport her coffin to the lake without the officials knowing. I have found a man in Shaoxing who can help.

(She stops as coughing nearly overwhelms her. Through pure self-will she controls herself, picks up the brush and continues.)

Write to me. We must act quickly.

(She sets the brush down. She reads what she has written. Then she adds one more line.)

WU ZHIYING (writing): She spoke of you often. In her last months, you were the one at her side. I do not know you. But I know she loved you. That is enough for me.

(She folds the letter. She seals it.)

(She holds it in both hands.)

(She speaks — to the letter, to Xu Zihua, to Qiu Jin.)

WU ZHIYING: I do not know if you will answer. I do not know if you are even alive.

(Pause.)

But you are the only other person in the world who loved her the way I did.

(She sets the letter down.)

That makes you my sister.

(She stands. She moves to the window. She opens the curtains. Light floods the room.)

(She blinks as if she had forgotten sunlight was even possible.)

(She calls out.)

WU ZHIYING: Messenger!

(The MESSENGER enters — the same young man from Scene 10. He is frightened. He is always frightened.)

MESSENGER: Madam?

WU ZHIYING: This must go to Zhejiang. Xunxi Girls' School. Do not let anyone else touch it.

MESSENGER: Madam, the roads are dangerous—

WU ZHIYING: Then avoid the danger.

(He takes the letter. He leaves.)

(Wu Zhiying stands alone.)

(She looks at the scroll on the wall — Qiu Jin's calligraphy.)

(She speaks — not to Qiu Jin now. To herself.)

WU ZHIYING: "One life, not preserved. / For millennia, a heroic name lives."

(Whatever she was suffering in the beginning of the scene, she has turned her trauma into a weapon.)

(She bows her head.)

(Lights fade.)

)(*)(

SCENE 14: THE FUNERAL

Setting: West Lake, Hangzhou. Spring 1908.

The stage is bare. A single willow branch hangs from above — the suggestion of a tree, of water, of a place where heroes are buried.

A grave marker. Simple. Unadorned. A mound of earth.

WU ZHIYING and XU ZIHUA kneel at the grave. They have been here for some time.

The sound of a crowd — distant, murmuring. Not loud. Just present. Waiting.

Wu Zhiying reads her eulogy first. Not loudly. Not whispered. Simply.

WU ZHIYING:

“Are you sated by my great offering of wine?

Looking back at Jiangting, one farewell, many tears.

Today at Xiling I risk a great wailing.

I cannot sing your song, ‘The Precious Sword’."

(She pauses.)

(Xu Zihua speaks.)

XU ZIHUA:

Those few of us who still keep our promises

will hang up our swords at her grave like the loyal Yanling.

From now on, the waves of Xiling,

when they reach this bridge, will not rest.

(Wu Zhiying speaks again.)

WU ZHIYING:

Painful is the memory of our parting,

tears of the lone traveler fell like silken thread.

Alone, I gaze upon the sun that sets behind the lone grave mount,

Holding my sorrow, which no one can know.

XU ZIHUA:

The one who lies here met a bloody end,

though now may rest by a good lake and a green hill, at home.

Oh let my grave be at the right side of yours —

under the bright moon, we will wander together

among the pines and catalpas.

(Silence.)

(The crowd murmurs. Louder now. Restless.)

(Wu Zhiying speaks again — a different poem, one she wrote on the road to Shanyin.)

WU ZHIYING:

Vast and murky are heaven and earth,

a myriad of feelings assault me.

I gather your bones, my tears soak the kerchief.

Autumn wind, autumn rain,

along the Shanyin road,

Sigh upon sigh,

it is not easy to be a survivor.

(She pauses.)

(Xu Zihua speaks her final poem.)

XU ZIHUA:

A legend of blood has been written.

Fortunately, there are green hills to hold the white bones.

Nanhu has built a bower for "Mourning Autumn";

Will you visit us there, when the wind comes, and the rain?

(They wait.)

(The wind.)

(Silence.)

(Then — footsteps.)

(GULIN steps forward from the crowd. He is a Manchu official. He is not there to mourn. He is there to control the narrative.)

(He speaks — not shouting. Calm. Measured. Dangerous.)

GULIN: This is not a hero's grave.

(Wu and Xu turn to look at him.)

(The crowd stirs. Murmurs grow.)

GULIN: The Qing did not steal this land. We took it from bandits. You honor a criminal.

(Wu and Xu do not answer.)

(The crowd erupts.)

(Boos. Shouts. Protest. The sound is not organized. It is not clean. It is messy, loud, and undeniable.)

(Gulin looks around. He is surrounded. Not by soldiers. By voices, common voices.)

(He tries to continue but cannot compete.)

(He leaves. Angry. Humiliated.)

(The crowd continues. Their voices swell.)

(Wu and Xu look at each other.)

(A nod.)

(Darkness.)

(The sound of the crowd continues — not fading, not diminishing, but growing, spreading, as if all of China were protesting.)

(The lights are gone. The stage is black. But the sound remains.)

(Long pause.)

(Gradually — very gradually — the crowd begins to fade. Not because they have stopped. Because they have moved beyond this place, this moment, this grave.)

(Silence.)

(Then, very faintly, the sound of wind.)

)(*)(

SCENE 15: AFTERMATH

Setting: West Lake, Hangzhou. The present day. The statue of Qiu Jin.

The stage is bare. A single light rises on the statue — a suggestion, a shape, a presence.

A VISITOR stands before it. She holds a red silk scarf in one hand. A small print — a woodblock image of Qiu Jin's face — is tucked into her pocket, visible but not explained.

She speaks — not to the audience. To the statue. To Qiu Jin.

VISITOR: I have been standing here for an hour.

(Pause.)

People walk by. They mistake me for someone else. A tourist. A student. A ghost.

(She looks at the statue.)

I do not correct them.

(She steps closer. She touches the base of the statue.)

There was a printmaker once. In 1979. She carved your face into wood and pressed it onto paper. She said, "No one can tell how great Qiu Jin is."

(She pauses.)

There was a filmmaker. She made a film where women with swords danced to your poems. She called you a "messy revolutionary." A drama queen.

(She almost smiles.)

I think she was right.

(She is silent for a moment.)

(Then she speaks — a line of poetry. Qiu Jin's line. The one that started everything.)

VISITOR: "Don't tell me women are not the stuff of heroes..."

(She pauses.)

(She wraps the red scarf around the base of the statue. She places the print beside it.)

(She steps back.)

(She bows her head.)

VISITOR: I am not the first person to stand here. I will not be the last.

(The light fades slowly — very slowly — until there is nothing but darkness.)

(Silence.)

(Then, very faintly, the sound of wind.)

(Then — a new sound. Footsteps. Someone else approaching the statue.)

(The play does not end. It continues. Offstage. Into the future.)

(Blackout.)

)(*)(

EPILOGUE: THE JINGWEI BIRD

The stage is dark.

A single light rises on QIU JIN. She stands alone. She holds no sword. She holds no brush. She simply stands, facing the audience.

She speaks — not as the character Qiu Jin, but as the writer Qiu Jin, reaching out across a century to speak directly to us.

QIU JIN: I live in an era of transition.

(Pause.)

I’ve taken advantage of the glimmer of civilization that appears here — small, fragile, like light through a crack in a closed door — to expand the… (Pause, selecting the word.) boundaries of my universe.

(She steps forward.)

I am not very erudite. I have read fewer books than the men who dismiss me. I have studied fewer classics than the scholars who mock me. But I know this: it is always very painful for me to think that women in my country live in a world of darkness.

As if drunk.

As if immersed in a dream.

Without any knowledge.

(She touches her chest.)

There is a bird in the old stories. The Jingwei bird. She was a girl once — a girl who drowned in the Eastern Sea. She did not accept her death. She did not accept the sea's power over her. She transformed. She became a bird. And every day, she carries twigs and stones from the Western Mountains to fill the sea.

Every day.

She will never fill it. She knows this. The sea is vast. The sea is ancient. The sea does not care about her small stones.

But she carries them anyway.

She looks out at the audience.

That is what I am doing. Carrying stones. Writing poems. Starting newspapers. Opening schools. Training women to fight. Small things. Impossible things.

They will kill me for it. I know this too.

(She almost smiles.)

But the Jingwei bird does not stop. Neither will I.

(The light begins to fade.)

(She speaks her final words into the dark.)

秋風秋雨愁煞人.

Qiūfēng qiūyǔ, lìng xīnzhōng chōngyíngzhe nányǐ chéngshòu de āichóu.

Autumn wind, autumn rain, fills my heart with sorrow.

(Blackout.)

)(*)(

AUTHOR'S NOTE

This play is based on the historical lives of Qiu Jin (1875-1907), Wu Zhiying (1857-1918), and Xu Zihua (1873-1935). While the dialogue and specific scenes are dramatized, the major events — the meeting in Beijing, the escape to Japan, the Golden Orchid oath, the founding of Chinese Women's News, the Xunxi School, the failed uprising, the execution, the secret burial at West Lake — are documented in historical sources.

The poetry in Act One, Scene 5 (Wu Zhiying's oath poem) is my own dramatic reconstruction. The poems in Act Three, Scene 14 are authentic translations of Wu Zhiying's "Mourning Qiu Jin at Xiling" and Xu Zihua's response poems, as documented in Hu Ying's Burying Autumn and other scholarly sources.

The author wishes to acknowledge the scholarly work of Hu Ying (Burying Autumn), Li-li Ch'en (Women Writers of Traditional China), Yilin Wang (The Lantern and the Night Moths), and the archival research that has preserved these women's stories.

ZJC (20206)

)(*)(

As supplementary sources go, this was my very first attempt at translating Qiu Jin’s poetry years and years ago; the poem that started it all. The original title reads, “A Reply Verse in Matching Rhyme (for Ishii-kun, a Japanese friend).” At the time I simply wrote, “A first attempt, by a young translator, who found Qiu Jin in an old anthology and fell in love.”

Don’t tell me women

are not the stuff of heroes,

I alone rode over the East Sea’s

winds for ten thousand leagues.

My poetic thoughts ever expanding,

like a sail between ocean and heaven.

I dream of your three islands,

all gems, all dazzling with moonlight.

I grieve to think of the bronze camels,

guardians of China, lost in thorns.

Ashamed, I have done nothing;

not one victory to my name.

I simply make my war horse sweat.

Grieving over my native land

hurts my heart. So tell me;

how can I spend these days here?

A guest enjoying your spring winds?

#Qiu Jin #The Autumn Wind #Act 3 #Chinese revolutionary #Chinese translation #feminist #super star #drama #ZJC #poetry #poem #Autumn wind #autumn rain #fills my heart with sorrow

THE AUTUMN WIND (based on the life and poetry of Qiu Jin) ~ ACT III

A Play in Three Acts.

By ZJC (2026)

Characters:

QIU JIN (30s) — Revolutionary, poet, swordswoman. She leaves her husband and children to change China. She will not succeed. She will be remembered.

WU ZHIYING (late 40s) — Poet, calligrapher, wife of a Qing official. She helps Qiu Jin escape to Japan. She loves her across distance and death.

XU ZIHUA (40s) — Widowed principal of Xunxi Girls' School. She hires Qiu Jin. She becomes Qiu Jin's partner, her sister, her gravedigger.

XU XILIN (30s) — Qiu Jin's cousin. Revolutionary. He recruits her into the Restoration Society. His failure causes her death.

THE STATE (Actor 5) — Messenger, Official, Executioner, Gulin. The face of the government that wants to erase her.

Running Time: Approximately 90 minutes.

)(*)(

ACT THREE: THE ELEGY

SCENE 11: THE MADNESS OF WU ZHIYING

Setting: Wu Zhiying's house, Beijing. July 1907.

The same room as Act One. On the wall, a scroll of calligraphy: 安排嬌骨用鞭摑 — in Qiu Jin's handwriting. It would be droll if anyone was in the mood for such frivolous gestures.

But the room is a wreck. Dark. Curtains drawn. Table overturned. A broken tea set. A black mess where a pot of ink had been thrown against a wall in rage.

A single candle burns low — it has been burning for days.

Books, poems, papers are scattered on the floor. A life of letters has been dropped and not picked up.

WU ZHIYING sits on the floor. Hair undone. She does not move, staring at nothing. She has been here for days.

The candle flickers.

She mumbles — these are not words to be heard by anyone.

WU ZHIYING: "One life..."

(She stops.)

(She tries again.)

"One life..."

(She cannot finish.)

(She looks at the writing brush on the floor. She does not pick it up.)

(Blackout.)

(When the lights come on again time has passed. A couple of days — a thousand years, it is impossible to know.)

(Wu Zhiying has moved beyond grief into a new state — not mania, but she is a woman driven by a feverish goal that has consumed her.)

(Regardless, she sits at her table, now right side up, writing furiously.)

(Whatever sentiment that drove her to say, "I will stay here in this house pouring tea," in Act 1 has been forgotten.)

(She stops. Puts down her brush with ink-stained fingers.)

(Silently reads her lines.)

(She closes her eyes. Gathers her thoughts. A long pause.)

(She begins to write. Stops. Adds a thought and puts down the brush.)

(She picks up the paper and finally reads it out loud.)

WU ZHIYING: "One life, not preserved, / For millennia, a heroic name lives."

(At some earlier time she would have paused to enjoy such a powerful, creative success. Not today. She places the paper on top of the pile of finished work.)

(She sits. Picks up her brush and begins to write once more.)

(Blackness.)

(When the lights come up this time Wu Zhiying has transformed. She is still ill, still weak, but her hair is washed and her clothes clean. Her manuscripts organized into piles in front of her.)

(She speaks as she writes.)

WU ZHIYING (writing and coughing): To Xu Zihua, Principal of Xunxi Girls' School —

(She writes.)

You have suggested a burial site by West Lake. Xiling. The place Qiu Jin herself wanted.

(She writes.)

(She stops as coughing nearly overwhelms her. Through pure self-will she controls herself, picks up the brush and continues.)

Write to me. We must act quickly.

(She sets the brush down. She reads what she has written. Then she adds one more line.)

WU ZHIYING (writing): She spoke of you often. In her last months, you were the one at her side. I do not know you. But I know she loved you. That is enough for me.

(She folds the letter. She seals it.)

(She holds it in both hands.)

(She speaks — to the letter, to Xu Zihua, to Qiu Jin.)

WU ZHIYING: I do not know if you will answer. I do not know if you are even alive.

(Pause.)

But you are the only other person in the world who loved her the way I did.

(She sets the letter down.)

That makes you my sister.

(She stands. She moves to the window. She opens the curtains. Light floods the room.)

(She blinks as if she had forgotten sunlight was even possible.)

(She calls out.)

WU ZHIYING: Messenger!

(The MESSENGER enters — the same young man from Scene 10. He is frightened. He is always frightened.)

MESSENGER: Madam?

WU ZHIYING: This must go to Zhejiang. Xunxi Girls' School. Do not let anyone else touch it.

MESSENGER: Madam, the roads are dangerous—

WU ZHIYING: Then avoid the danger.

(He takes the letter. He leaves.)

(Wu Zhiying stands alone.)

(She looks at the scroll on the wall — Qiu Jin's calligraphy.)

(She speaks — not to Qiu Jin now. To herself.)

WU ZHIYING: "One life, not preserved. / For millennia, a heroic name lives."

(Whatever she was suffering in the beginning of the scene, she has turned her trauma into a weapon.)

(She bows her head.)

(Lights fade.)

)(*)(

SCENE 14: THE FUNERAL

Setting: West Lake, Hangzhou. Spring 1908.

The stage is bare. A single willow branch hangs from above — the suggestion of a tree, of water, of a place where heroes are buried.

A grave marker. Simple. Unadorned. A mound of earth.

WU ZHIYING and XU ZIHUA kneel at the grave. They have been here for some time.

The sound of a crowd — distant, murmuring. Not loud. Just present. Waiting.

Wu Zhiying reads her eulogy first. Not loudly. Not whispered. Simply.

WU ZHIYING:

“Are you sated by my great offering of wine?

Looking back at Jiangting, one farewell, many tears.

Today at Xiling I risk a great wailing.

I cannot sing your song, ‘The Precious Sword’."

(She pauses.)

(Xu Zihua speaks.)

XU ZIHUA:

Those few of us who still keep our promises

will hang up our swords at her grave like the loyal Yanling.

From now on, the waves of Xiling,

when they reach this bridge, will not rest.

(Wu Zhiying speaks again.)

WU ZHIYING:

Painful is the memory of our parting,

tears of the lone traveler fell like silken thread.

Alone, I gaze upon the sun that sets behind the lone grave mount,

Holding my sorrow, which no one can know.

XU ZIHUA:

The one who lies here met a bloody end,

though now may rest by a good lake and a green hill, at home.

Oh let my grave be at the right side of yours —

under the bright moon, we will wander together

among the pines and catalpas.

(Silence.)

(The crowd murmurs. Louder now. Restless.)

(Wu Zhiying speaks again — a different poem, one she wrote on the road to Shanyin.)

WU ZHIYING:

Vast and murky are heaven and earth,

a myriad of feelings assault me.

I gather your bones, my tears soak the kerchief.

Autumn wind, autumn rain,

along the Shanyin road,

Sigh upon sigh,

it is not easy to be a survivor.

(She pauses.)

(Xu Zihua speaks her final poem.)

XU ZIHUA:

A legend of blood has been written.

Fortunately, there are green hills to hold the white bones.

Nanhu has built a bower for "Mourning Autumn";

Will you visit us there, when the wind comes, and the rain?

(They wait.)

(The wind.)

(Silence.)

(Then — footsteps.)

(GULIN steps forward from the crowd. He is a Manchu official. He is not there to mourn. He is there to control the narrative.)

(He speaks — not shouting. Calm. Measured. Dangerous.)

GULIN: This is not a hero's grave.

(Wu and Xu turn to look at him.)

(The crowd stirs. Murmurs grow.)

GULIN: The Qing did not steal this land. We took it from bandits. You honor a criminal.

(Wu and Xu do not answer.)

(The crowd erupts.)

(Boos. Shouts. Protest. The sound is not organized. It is not clean. It is messy, loud, and undeniable.)

(Gulin looks around. He is surrounded. Not by soldiers. By voices, common voices.)

(He tries to continue but cannot compete.)

(He leaves. Angry. Humiliated.)

(The crowd continues. Their voices swell.)

(Wu and Xu look at each other.)

(A nod.)

(Darkness.)

(The sound of the crowd continues — not fading, not diminishing, but growing, spreading, as if all of China were protesting.)

(The lights are gone. The stage is black. But the sound remains.)

(Long pause.)

(Gradually — very gradually — the crowd begins to fade. Not because they have stopped. Because they have moved beyond this place, this moment, this grave.)

(Silence.)

(Then, very faintly, the sound of wind.)

)(*)(

SCENE 15: AFTERMATH

Setting: West Lake, Hangzhou. The present day. The statue of Qiu Jin.

The stage is bare. A single light rises on the statue — a suggestion, a shape, a presence.

A VISITOR stands before it. She holds a red silk scarf in one hand. A small print — a woodblock image of Qiu Jin's face — is tucked into her pocket, visible but not explained.

She speaks — not to the audience. To the statue. To Qiu Jin.

VISITOR: I have been standing here for an hour.

(Pause.)

People walk by. They mistake me for someone else. A tourist. A student. A ghost.

(She looks at the statue.)

I do not correct them.

(She steps closer. She touches the base of the statue.)

There was a printmaker once. In 1979. She carved your face into wood and pressed it onto paper. She said, "No one can tell how great Qiu Jin is."

(She pauses.)

There was a filmmaker. She made a film where women with swords danced to your poems. She called you a "messy revolutionary." A drama queen.

(She almost smiles.)

I think she was right.

(She is silent for a moment.)

(Then she speaks — a line of poetry. Qiu Jin's line. The one that started everything.)

VISITOR: "Don't tell me women are not the stuff of heroes..."

(She pauses.)

(She wraps the red scarf around the base of the statue. She places the print beside it.)

(She steps back.)

(She bows her head.)

VISITOR: I am not the first person to stand here. I will not be the last.

(The light fades slowly — very slowly — until there is nothing but darkness.)

(Silence.)

(Then, very faintly, the sound of wind.)

(Then — a new sound. Footsteps. Someone else approaching the statue.)

(The play does not end. It continues. Offstage. Into the future.)

(Blackout.)

)(*)(

EPILOGUE: THE JINGWEI BIRD

The stage is dark.

A single light rises on QIU JIN. She stands alone. She holds no sword. She holds no brush. She simply stands, facing the audience.

She speaks — not as the character Qiu Jin, but as the writer Qiu Jin, reaching out across a century to speak directly to us.

QIU JIN: I live in an era of transition.

(Pause.)

(She steps forward.)

As if drunk.

As if immersed in a dream.

Without any knowledge.

(She touches her chest.)

Every day.

She will never fill it. She knows this. The sea is vast. The sea is ancient. The sea does not care about her small stones.

But she carries them anyway.

She looks out at the audience.

That is what I am doing. Carrying stones. Writing poems. Starting newspapers. Opening schools. Training women to fight. Small things. Impossible things.

They will kill me for it. I know this too.

(She almost smiles.)

But the Jingwei bird does not stop. Neither will I.

(The light begins to fade.)

(She speaks her final words into the dark.)

秋風秋雨愁煞人.

Qiūfēng qiūyǔ, lìng xīnzhōng chōngyíngzhe nányǐ chéngshòu de āichóu.

Autumn wind, autumn rain, fills my heart with sorrow.

(Blackout.)

)(*)(

AUTHOR'S NOTE

ZJC (20206)

)(*)(

Don’t tell me women

are not the stuff of heroes,

I alone rode over the East Sea’s

winds for ten thousand leagues.

My poetic thoughts ever expanding,

like a sail between ocean and heaven.

I dream of your three islands,

all gems, all dazzling with moonlight.

I grieve to think of the bronze camels,

guardians of China, lost in thorns.

Ashamed, I have done nothing;

not one victory to my name.

I simply make my war horse sweat.

Grieving over my native land

hurts my heart. So tell me;

how can I spend these days here?

A guest enjoying your spring winds?

#Qiu Jin #The Autumn Wind #Act 3 #Chinese revolutionary #Chinese translation #feminist #super star #drama #ZJC #poetry #poem #Autumn wind #autumn rain #fills my heart with sorrow

#autumn wind

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