The pain and challenges of love manifest through the imagery of a cruel hand and lost ducklings. Artists and lovers face obstacles in their desire to unite, revising their agreements to separate instead. This transformation illustrates the harsh lessons taught by life. A reflective journey takes place where the speaker navigates through nature, symbolizing the internal struggle between youthful innocence and adult responsibilities. The light filtering through the branches represents hope, yet the dichotomy of the boy and man reflects the complexity of growing up and letting go of love.
"You mysterious cruel hand, you cold dropped and not-yet-dropped rain, you broken line of lost ducklings. Look what you did to the artists, the lovers who wanted to walk the Great Wall of China from opposite ends, to meet and marry..."
"...pushing them on till they revised the agreement, promised not to meet to marry but to meet to separate, for you are a harsh teacher."
"The morning after I sent the last letter I would write as a husband, I trod a path of prickly leaves through trees like long brown fingers of cracked bark, poking the blue belly sky..."
"...where the sun kept breaking light through the glistening gaps of the bare branches that sent the boy in me one way, the man the other."
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