Life and Death are Wearing Me Out

liquor into his mouth, then held the bottle up over his shoulder.
    “Okay,” he said, “you can go now.”
    With a wave of his pole, he started walking. Yingchun got down on her knees, brought her hands together, and raised them to the moon, which shone down gently on her dancing tears, her graying hair, and her quivering lips . . .
    In the face of this mutual love, I stood up in total disregard of the possible consequences, for I believed they would know in their hearts who I was and would not take me as some sort of monster. Supporting my front hooves on the springy tops of wheat stalks, I walked up to them along one of the field ridges. Clasping my hooves together, I bowed to them and made a pig noise to greet them. They gaped at me, blank looks that held shock and puzzlement. I am Ximen Nao, I said. I distinctly heard human sounds emerge from my throat, but there was no reaction from them. After what seemed like a long time, Yingchun shrieked, while Lan Lian pointed his pole at me and said:
    “Pig demon, kill me if that’s what you want, but I beg you, please don’t trample my crops.”
    Crippling sadness suddenly filled my heart. Humans and beasts walk down separate roads that virtually never intersect. Lowering myself down on all fours, I fled through the wheat field, crestfallen. But my mood improved the closer I came to Apricot Garden. All creatures on earth follow their own nature. Birth, old age, sickness, and death; joys and sorrows, partings and reunions, are dictated by irreversible objective laws. I was a boar at the time, so I had to carry out my boar responsibilities. Lan Lian stuck by his obstinacy to remain apart from the masses, so it was necessary for me, Pig Sixteen, to use my great intelligence, extreme courage, and extraordinary physical abilities to accomplish something that would stun the world, and crowd my piggish way into human history.
    After entering Apricot Garden, I pretty much put Lan Lian and Yingchun out of my mind. Why? Because I saw that Diao Xiaosan had already seduced Butterfly Lover and had her hot to trot. Of the other twenty-nine sows, fourteen had already escaped from their pens, while the remaining fifteen were either banging their heads against the gates or crying to the moon. A grand prologue to mating was slowly opening. Before the major player had made his appearance, his understudy was already onstage. Damn him! I wouldn’t allow it.

29

Pig Sixteen Battles Diao Xiaosan
The Straw Hat Song Accompanies a Loyalty Dance
    Diao Xiaosan sat with his back against the renowned apricot tree, holding an upturned straw hat filled with yellow apricots. One after another, he picked them up with his right hoof and tossed them into his mouth, smacking his lips as he ate the fruit and then spit out the pits, which landed several yards away. Resting under a skinny apricot tree separated some four or five yards from Diao Xiaosan, Butterfly Lover held a broken plastic comb in one hand and a hand mirror in the other, putting on flirtatious, coquettish airs. Ah, dear sow, your weakness is coveting petty gains. A tiny mirror and a broken comb, and you would take any boar to bed. Every so often Diao threw one of his apricots over to where the dozen or so sows that had escaped from their pens were glancing longingly in his direction and oinking suggestively They fought over every one. Little Brother, don’t hanker only after Butterfly Lover, we love you too and we’d be happy to help you carry on your line. The sows teased him with the most suggestive language they knew The thought of obtaining a wife and a harem made him deliriously happy, as if floating on air. After shaking his legs, he began to hum a little tune and, hat in hand, danced a jig. The sows joined in, some twirling in place and others rolling on the ground. The wretched quality of their dancing aroused feelings of contempt in me. Butterfly Lover laid her mirror and comb down at the base of the tree and began wiggling her bottom, setting her tail in motion as she sidled over to Diao Xiaosan. As soon as she was near enough, she dropped her head and raised her hindquarters. With that in sight, I leaped into the air like an antelope out on the Serengeti and landed in the space between Butterfly Lover and Diao Xiaosan. Now they could only dream about the joy they nearly made a reality.
    My appearance on the scene threw cold water on Butterfly Lover’s burning desire. She turned and retreated back to the skinny apricot