Hong Kong human rights lawyer Chow Hang-tung is detained over her role in organizing the city’s Tiananmen crackdown vigil, for which she faces up to 10 years in jail under the National Security Law. Her partner and fellow activist, Ye Du, is living under police surveillance in the Chinese city of Guangzhou. Ahead of Valentine’s Day, here Ye Du shares a poem he has written to his imprisoned partner.
By Ye Du
This poem was written last Mid-Autumn Festival, a Moon festival celebrated in Asia when the Moon is believed to be at its brightest. In our time, writing poetry is no longer just about expression or confession; it is an act of steadfast resistance. When meetings with a loved one are stubbornly blocked by authorities, and every message is filtered or intercepted, gazing at the same moon becomes the most immediate and unstealable form of intimacy. Even in a world that forces us apart, we still choose each other.
Even so, this poem had to be sent anonymously to get past deliberate censorship and reach Hang-tung. She later replied with a poem of her own, but its fate was the same as more than 10 letters she sent me in 2025. Only one miraculously made it through; the rest disappeared into invisible black holes. Even a simple card with “Happy Birthday” written on it was deliberately intercepted, as if even the most restrained expressions of feeling were considered dangerous. This was no accident. It is a clear sign of a new era arriving at what was once a harbour of freedom: emotions themselves are now treated as risks to be managed.
Revisiting this Mid-Autumn poem on Valentine’s Day is not about celebrating the holiday itself. Festivals are simply human-made markers in time, meant to remind us that our feelings have not been worn away by the years. As long as we continue to hold each other in our hearts, as long as there is a place reserved for one another, the authorities cannot achieve their true aim: making us accept separation as natural and silence as reasonable.
That moon, suspended by the wind above the city walls,
like a silver bowl brimming with night and untold stories,
sways gently, spilling light into silent streets and alleys.
The curve of water cupped by the city’s outline
is like a watchful eye, quietly gathering the streetlights
and reflecting distant glimmers.
Wind passes through the tall buildings,
carrying letters that were never sent.
Reaching out, I only grasp the edge of moonlight.
Between light and shadow, your silhouette
hides like a distant lantern across the shore, unreachable.
The city is like a map cut and rearranged,
its towers isolated like islands.
The sound of wind and sea separates one from another.
People pacing below each step
leave an unspoken shadow,
and invisible boundaries.
The distant lights are withdrawn.
Ships lie silent.
The sound drops to nothing but wind.
The streets that once stirred with life
now have even the light arranged into straight lines.
The moon still hangs high,
as if to remind me
that every hope
must be hidden in the night.
Wind sweeps past my window,
and I fold it into my breath,
into every unsent word,
into every quiet gaze,
as if letting it cross the city walls
and gently tap on your window.
The wind stops.
The moon still drifts, illuminating the city within my heart,
and lighting the streets that have been withdrawn,
the voices suppressed,
and the lights aligned into straight lines.
I take moonlight as stationery,
wind as paper,
folding them into countless small boats,
letting them
pass through the towers,
cross the harbour,
and float toward you.
Mid-Autumn, 2025
