CP in Mongolia

A poem by Mongolian scholar-poet Zava Damdin (b. 1976).

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ON WRITING POETRY

(English Translation)

Writing poetry,
ah, it is more flavourful than any sumptuous feast.
It awakens the brain and the nervous system
like walking barefoot through the morning dew.

To the revered masters and elders I hold sacred,
I offer my words to them through song.
Even in a sigh,
ten thousand knots of meaning can be drawn together into a single line.

It is as though I meet the forever-sixteen-year-old maiden ¹
at a stall of the poetic arts, where no payment is required.
Though I know not how to play the bivaan, ²
still I hold it in my embrace.

And that lovely maiden, rather than turning me away,
joins me in composing a song together.
Thus we wander here and there,
to the wonder and delight of heroes, heroines, and ordinary people. ³

While all two-legged beings,
weary from their pursuits, lie asleep,
how wondrous it is, then,
to walk hand in hand with her through the city streets,
conversing, stanza after another.

Somewhere, we encounter an old woman
leaning upon a staff of profound words,
who gives a sign, saying,
“So, you too are walking this way?”

Even my unwavering old master,
the most Venerable One, ⁴
appearing in manifold emanations,
tests and observes his son.

The clumsy strokes of my brush
may lack skill and elegance,
yet they still contend
with the sons of Tenger. ⁵

The lines drawn by my dull steel pen
may lack delicacy and refinement,
yet they wrestle
even with the poets of this earth.

Within the music of my verse, ⁶
the melodious voice of that maiden clears and suffuses, ⁷
and the necklace of words I string together
takes on the grace of young men and women dancing in mutual accord.

Even my enemies,
in their dreams, gnashing their teeth and flexing their claws,
when struck by the whip of abundant wisdom, as though lightning were unleashed,
their twisted thoughts loosen, and they find a little peace.

And those endowed with ancient affinities ⁸
wander through my flowering garden of poetry,
and there partake of abundant bliss,
like bees delighting in sweet nectar.

Travelling upon the golden spider’s web, ⁹
it is especially fitting to write poetry;
at stations amid the multitude, or journeying by train,
with neither stage nor audience, as though it were a vast assembly.

Conversing with the melodious maiden and laughing at times,
no one pays me any heed, taking me for a person gone mad;
ah, to walk through this very cycle of existence holding her hand
as though floating within the vast emptiness of boundless space. ¹⁰ ¹¹

Grassy Mountain’s Young Wanderer
18 August 2026
Tokyo, Japan

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ШҮЛЭГ БИЧИХҮЙ ИНҮ

(Original Mongolian)

Шүлэг бичихүй инү ямарч тансаг зоогноос илүү амттай аму
Шүүдрээр хөл нүцгэн алхах мэт тархи мэдрэлийг сэргээмүй
Шүтээн болсон дээдэс нүгүүд лүгээ зөвхөн дууллаар л өчил өчиж
Шүүрс алдахуй дор ч түмэн утгын зангилааг нэг мөрөөр тодорхойлмуй

Мөнх арван зургаатай охин лугаа яруу зохистын үнэгүй мухлаг дор болзож
Мөнөөх биваан хөгжмийг инү ч тоглож чадах үгүй байж тэвэрч үзмүй
Тэрхүү гоо охин харин намайг голох үгүй хамт дуулал тэрлэлцэж
Тэгүүбээр эгүүбээр зорчих баатад хийгээд багатудчидыг гайхан баясуулмуй

Хоёр хөлтөн нүгүүд буруу алжаасаар наадан зүдээд унтаж байх зуур
Хотын гудамжаар тэгүүн лүгээ хөтлөлцөөд л бадаг бадгаар ярилцах ану гайхамшигтай
Хаа нэгтээ гүн үгсийн таяг тулсан эмгэн таараад чи бээр ийн тийн явах аму хэмээн эш үзүүлж
Хатамжит дээд өвгөн богд мину хүртэл элдэв хувилгаан дүрээр хөвгүүнээ тэнсэж ажирмуй

Молхи бийрний мину дохилт тийн уран бус ч тэнгэрийн хөвгүүд лүгээ ч тэнсэлдэж
Мохорхон ган үзгийн мину татлага тийн нарилаг бус ч газрын найрагчид лугаа ч гацалдамуй
Утгын уянга дор мину мөнөөх охины яруухан хоолой тунаран шингэж бүрүүн лүгээ
Үгсийн сондор хэлхэхүй дор бүжээч хөвгүүд охид зохилдон наадах мэт нэн зохистой болгоомуй

Атаатан нугууд зүүдэн дороо ч үе үе шүдээ зуун хумсаа хөдөлгөхүй бөгөөд
Арвис ухааны ташуураар аянга буулгах мэт гөвөхүй дор атирсан санаа нь тавигдаж өчүүхэн амар болмуй
Аль эртний барилдлага төгөлдөр нүгүүд яруу зохистын цэцэглиг дор мину зорчин эдэлж
Амтат балын дарсан дор согтсон зөгийс мэт үлэмжхэн амгаланг эдлэхүй инү утга төгөлдөр амуй

Алтан аалзны тороор дамжин аялахуй дор шүлэг бичихүй инү нэн зохистой
Аху түмний буудал хийгээд галт тэргэн лүгээ зорчихуй дор тайз болон үзэгч үгүй их чуулган хэмээлтэй
Аялгуут охин лугаа хүүрнэн зарим үе инээхүй дор нэгэн солиот хүмүүн л аж хэмээн хэн бээр үл тоомуй
Ай, яг энэ орчил дор түүний гараас хөтлөөд алхахуй ану агуу хоосон агаар дор жингүйдэх мэт амуй

Зүлэгт уулын бадарчин хөвгүүн
18.08.2026
Токио, Япон

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DISCUSSION

And so the question arises:

What, if anything, is especially “Mongolian” about this poem?

1. LANGUAGE

Perhaps the first place to look is not for conspicuous images of the steppe, but at the poem’s language itself. The most striking feature is its register. Forms such as “indeed/as for it” (инү), “is/indeed is” (аму, амуй), “will/is” (болмуй), “awakens” (сэргээмүй), “makes clear” (тодорхойлмуй), “making confession” (өчил өчиж), “with” (лүгээ/лугаа), the archaizing plural form (нүгүүд), “as for it/that” (ану), the emphatic or agentive particle (бээр), and “saying/thus saying” (хэмээн) give the poem a deliberately older literary texture. One might hear in this an echo of the long history in which Buddhist translation and composition helped shape Mongolian literary language. Johan Elverskog’s work on Mongolian Buddhist textual traditions demonstrates the importance of translation, adaptation, and Mongolian-language Buddhist writing in the development of a specifically Mongolian Buddhist textual culture (Elverskog 2006).

The effect here is particularly striking because this elevated language suddenly accommodates “city streets” (хотын гудамж), a “train” (галт тэрэг), and “stations/stops” (буудал). An inherited Buddhist-Mongolian literary voice seems, quite naturally, to have stepped into contemporary urban life.

2. MOVEMENT

Might there also be something Mongolian in the poem’s persistent sense of movement? Zava Rinpoche’s poem repeatedly imagines existence through travelling: “journeying here and there” (тэгүүбээр эгүүбээр зорчих), walking through city streets, meeting someone along the way, travelling through stations and aboard a train, and finally “walking through this very cycle of existence” (яг энэ орчил дор … алхахуй).

It would be too strong to claim that movement itself is uniquely Mongolian. Yet the recurrence of journeying sits suggestively beside a Mongolian literary history in which mobility, nomadic existence, and encounters with modernity have repeatedly furnished writers with ways of thinking about identity and experience. Christopher Atwood, for example, shows how the Inner Mongolian poet Saichungga could make nomadic existence and the encounter with modernity part of the same literary imagination (Atwood 1999, 3–43).

In the above poem, it seems that spiritual experience similarly unfolds while moving through the world rather than withdrawing from it.

3. SIGNATURE

Does the signature sharpen that impression? “Grassy Mountain’s Young Wanderer” (Зүлэгт уулын бадарчин хөвгүүн) certainly does. “Wanderer” (бадарчин) seems to carry more cultural weight than the neutral English word “traveller”: it can suggest an itinerant wanderer or mendicant, while “Grassy Mountain” (Зүлэгт уул) returns that wandering to a landscape that is immediately compatible with Mongolian nomadic pastoral geography.

It may therefore be better to hear the signature not simply as a picturesque pseudonym, but as the final reinforcement of the poem’s recurring disposition toward movement.

Western scholarship on Mongolian literature and cultural history has repeatedly pointed out the continuing importance of mobility and pastoral life to Mongolian forms of self-representation, even as those forms enter modern literary contexts (Atwood 1999, 3–43; Wickhamsmith 2025).

4. TONE

And is there something recognisably “Mongolian” in the poem’s tone? Perhaps … though here I tread carefully. As I read it, the poem seems to move easily between elevated religious language and self-mocking earthiness. Rinpoche addresses the “venerable ones” (дээдэс), encounters profound wisdom, measures himself against the “sons of heaven” (тэнгэрийн хөвгүүд), and finally approaches “emptiness” (хоосон). Yet he also calls his brush “clumsy” (молхи), his pen “blunt” (мохорхон), imagines others dismissing him as “someone gone mad” (нэгэн солиот хүмүүн), and pictures his enemies grinding their teeth in their sleep.

There is another dimension to this self-deprecation, however. The “clumsy” brush and “blunt” pen can also be read as expressions of a Buddhist literary rhetoric of humility, in which an author conventionally diminishes their own capacities even while demonstrating considerable learning or literary skill.

Such professions of humility are well attested in Buddhist literary self-presentation, including writings associated with the Gelug tradition, although it would be too strong to describe them as a specifically Gelug requirement (Roesler 2014; Galli and Erhard 2021). In Zava Damdin Rinpoche’s case, this conventional humility acquires a particularly personal and playful form, and has become a recurrent feature of his literary voice: considerable learning and poetic confidence are repeatedly accompanied by gestures that diminish the composer of spiritual songs (cf. doha) himself. This conjunction of inherited literary convention and individual expression also points toward the broader Mongolian Buddhist textual world in which such compositions take shape.

Studies of Mongolian Buddhist textual culture likewise caution against imagining Buddhism as something isolated from broader Mongolian literary and social worlds; Mongolian Buddhist texts were translated, adapted, circulated, and understood within changing Mongolian historical circumstances (Elverskog 2006; Kollmar-Paulenz 2023, 86–111).

5. WISDOM IN HUMAN FORM

What, then, should we make of the “old woman leaning on a staff of profound words” (гүн үгсийн таяг тулсан эмгэн)? She appears unexpectedly on the road and offers an enigmatic indication concerning the poet’s journey. One might cautiously hear in the scene something of an oral-storytelling encounter, where knowledge emerges through a person met along the way rather than through abstract exposition.

Mongolia possesses exceptionally rich traditions of oral narrative and epic performance, and Chao Gejin’s study of the Oirat epic cycle of Jangar demonstrates how deeply journey, encounter, performance, and transmitted speech are embedded within Mongolian oral literary culture (Chao 2001, 401–35). But in reference to this poem, I would prefer to let the connection remain suggestive rather than fixed. There seems little need to say that this particular old woman must come from a specific folktale motif, even if something of that kind may well have been present in Zava Damdin Rinpoche’s own imaginative world. For us as readers, what comes through most immediately is that wisdom has taken human form and appeared beside the road. Immediately afterwards, the “venerable old holy master” (хатамжит дээд өвгөн богд) likewise appears in various manifestations and tests his “son.”

A mendicant’s travelled world thus becomes a place where Teachers may appear unexpectedly.

6. A GOLDEN SPIDER’S WEB

And finally, what of the extraordinary image of “travelling along a golden spider’s web” (алтан аалзны тороор дамжин аялахуй)? Here the image is not an abstract symbol but a vivid transformation of immediate experience. Zava Rinpoche was in Japan, at times travelling by rail from the Tokyo hub, when he composed this poem, and the “golden spider’s web” can therefore be read as a direct reference to this astonishingly intricate Japanese railway network.

Seen from within that experience, the metaphor becomes strikingly concrete: Rinpoche is physically moving through a vast mesh of intersecting lines while also travelling inwardly through poetic composition. The following line makes the connection explicit by referring to “stations” (буудал) and “travelling by train” (галт тэргэн лүгээ зорчихуй). The image thus binds together the actual railway journey, the act of writing poetry in transit, and the poem’s wider recurring language of movement.

7. DICTION AND IMAGERY

Perhaps, then, the answer to the original question should remain a tentative one. What feels especially Mongolian here is less any isolated symbol than the poem’s ability to let several worlds inhabit the same language: an inherited Buddhist literary register and contemporary city life; the wanderer and the railway passenger; the holy master and the old woman encountered on the road; elevated poetics and self-deprecating humour; “Grassy Mountain” (Зүлэгт уул) and Tokyo.

Scholarship on Mongolian literary and religious history has repeatedly shown that inherited traditions are not simply preserved unchanged, but are translated, reformulated, and made meaningful within changing historical and other circumstances (Atwood 1999, 3–43; Kollmar-Paulenz 2023, 86–111). This poem seems to enact that coexistence at the level of diction and imagery. Rather than an old literary voice being preserved behind glass, it is still travelling …

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NOTES

1
The “forever-sixteen-year-old maiden” (мөнх арван зургаатай охин) may evoke Янжинлхам (Yanginlam), a Mongolian Buddhist figure associated with poetry, music, eloquence, and artistic inspiration, and belonging to a broader religious and literary complex related to Yangchenma and Sarasvatī. The poem does not name her directly, however, and the identification should remain tentative. The association is suggested by the imagery surrounding the maiden: “poetic arts” (яруу зохист), the “biva instrument” (биваан хөгжим), her “melodious voice” (яруухан хоолой), and the “melody of meaning” (утгын уянга). She sings and converses with the poet, walks with him through the city, and speaks with him “stanza by stanza” (бадаг бадгаар). Taken together, these references make Янжинлхам a possible Mongolian cultural resonance behind the figure without requiring a direct identification with either Yangchenma or Sarasvatī. Within the poem she remains, at the same time, a poetic personification and intimate companion of poetic inspiration. I will seek further clarification on this point directly from Zava Damdin Rinpoche. ↩︎
2
Bivaan (биваан хөгжим): the Mongolian text retains the name of the stringed instrument rather than describing it generically as a “lute.” In the poem it belongs to the same imaginative world as the forever-sixteen-year-old maiden and the arts of poetry, music, and eloquence. The term may invite comparison with instruments traditionally associated with Sarasvatī/Янжинлхам, but I have retained the Mongolian bivaan rather than replacing it with vīṇā, biwa, or “lute,” since any one of these would make the identification more specific than the poem itself requires. This is an example of where retaining the Mongolian term preserves an important ambiguity that would otherwise be lost in translation. ↩︎
3
Heroes, heroines: the Mongolian plural “heroes” (баатад) does not require a gender-exclusive reading. The English has therefore been expanded explicitly to “heroes, heroines” to preserve that openness; the expansion is interpretive but transparent. ↩︎
4
“The most Venerable One” translates богд (Bogd), an exalted Mongolian honorific used of highly revered religious figures and historically also of rulers. Rather than retaining Bogd as an untranslated title or rendering it as the more theologically suggestive “Holy One,” I use “the most Venerable One” to convey its honorific register in this context. ↩︎
5
Tenger (тэнгэр) can mean “sky,” “heaven,” or a celestial/divine being in Mongolian, with deep roots in Mongolian religious and cosmological tradition. For readers less familiar with the term, it carries resonances of the sky, Heaven, and celestial or divine powers that are difficult to reproduce with a single English equivalent. I therefore retain the Mongolian Tenger here rather than narrowing its meaning to “Heaven” (Khomushku, Jamiyan et al. 2025). ↩︎
6
“Within the music of my verse” renders утгын уянга дор мину, more literally “within my melody of meaning.” The latter closely preserves утга (“meaning”), уянга (“melody, lyricism”), and мину (“my”), but in English the repeated m sounds of “my melody of meaning” become unusually conspicuous. I have therefore chosen “the music of my verse” to preserve the musical and poetic sense of the Mongolian while allowing the line to move more naturally in English. ↩︎
7
“Clears and suffuses” renders тунаран шингэж. Тунарах carries the sense of settling into clarity or becoming clear, while шингэх can suggest entering into, being absorbed, permeating, or becoming infused within something. Rather than the more literal but less musical “settles and is absorbed,” I have chosen “clears and suffuses” to preserve both movements: the maiden’s voice becomes clear and, at the same time, spreads through the poet’s “music of verse.” I am conscious, however, that this wording also reflects the process as I imagine it visually and poetically, and that this may not correspond exactly to what the Mongolian and Zava Rinpoche intends. ↩︎
8
“Ancient affinities” translates аль эртний барилдлага төгөлдөр нүгүүд. Here барилдлага carries the sense of connection, affinity, or karmic bond, while аль эртний places that connection far back in time. In the Buddhist context of the poem, the phrase may therefore suggest affinities formed through an ancient spiritual or lineage relationship. I retain the broader “ancient affinities” rather than specifying “lineage” in the translation, since the Mongolian itself leaves the nature of that connection open. ↩︎
9
Refer to “6. A Golden Spider’s Web” in the discussion below. ↩︎
10
The original Mongolian poem is arranged in six four-line stanzas. In this English translation, each original stanza has been divided into two shorter stanzas to accommodate the greater length of the English phrasing while preserving the sequence and internal structure of the Mongolian original. ↩︎
11
Translated by C.Pleteshner. English interpretation 31.08.2026 from the original Mongolian 18.08.2026. Translation is always an interpretation into another culture and one of its languages. Any errors in this regard are entirely my own, and for these I humbly apologise. ↩︎

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FURTHER READING

Mongolian Poetry 09: Poems and Tears To appreciate the ontological weight of “Writing Poetry,” one might also consider the visceral wellspring of “Poems and Tears,” where internal emotive states find their textual form.

Mongolian Poetry 10: Reflection The art, and also the act, of composition may inherently be a purposeful act of “Reflection,” thereby serving as a critical mirror through which a poet, such as the erudite Buddhist master Zava Damdin Rinpoche, perceives and then articulates subtle nuances of a Mongolian mind and heart.

Mongolian Poetry 15: Time “On Writing Poetry” necessarily engages in a dialogue with “Time,” acknowledging that the written verse serves as a temporal bridge between fleeting experiential moments and the possibilities of an enduring cultural archive.

Artscape 07: During the socialist times Examining the historical constraints of creative expression “During the Socialist times” provides an essential scholarly baseline for evaluating the modern freedoms and responsibilities inherent in the act of “Writing Poetry.”

The discipline of the poetic craft, as explored in these reflections, does not exist in isolation but is rooted in the vast internal topographies of a Mongolian scholar-poet such as Zava Damdin (b. 1976). To appreciate the search that precedes the act of composition, I humbly direct readers to a previous study, Mongolian Poetry 21: From the Landscape of the Mind, I Seek You. This earlier exploration of the “Landscape of the Mind” may serve as a useful ontological foundation.

Finally, the discipline of writing and translating poetry is not merely a linguistic exercise but is often an extension of a deeper, more profound spiritual aspiration. This quest for clarity through the written word parallels the broader human desire for transcendence and the pursuit of specialised knowledge. For another expression of how these creative and spiritual paths converge toward a unified understanding, you may like to explore Intermedia 04: The Wish to Make One’s Way Towards a Distant Enlightenment.

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REFERENCES

Atwood, Christopher P. 1999. “A Romantic Vision of National Regeneration: Some Unpublished Works of the Inner Mongolian Poet and Essayist, Saichungga.” Inner Asia 1 (1): 3–43. https://brill.com/view/journals/inas/1/1/article-p3_2.xml.

Chao, Gejin. 2001. “The Oirat Epic Cycle of Jangar.” Oral Tradition 16 (2): 401–435. https://journal.oraltradition.org/wp-content/uploads/files/articles/16ii/Chao.pdf.

Elverskog, Johan. 2006. Our Great Qing: The Mongols, Buddhism, and the State in Late Imperial China. Honolulu: University of Hawai‘i Press. https://books.google.com/books?id=BAk4LAKZLOEC.

Khomushku, Ayslan, B. Jamiyan, et al. 2025. “From Empire to Democracy: Political Culture and Foreign Policy of Mongolia in the 12th–21st Century.” Mongolian Diaspora. https://doi.org/10.1515/modi-2025-0023.

Kollmar-Paulenz, Karénina. 2023. “Nga rang gi chos khyod rang gi chos: ‘My Religion and Your Religion’? About Some Fundamental Issues in the Global History of Religion.” Journal for Religion and Transformation in Contemporary Society 10 (1): 86–111. https://brill.com/view/journals/jrat/10/1/article-p86_4.xml.

Wickhamsmith, Simon. 2025. Politics and Literature in Mongolia (1921–1948). Amsterdam: Amsterdam University Press. https://www.taylorfrancis.com/books/mono/10.5117/9789462984752/politics-literature-mongolia-1921-1948-simon-wickhamsmith.

End of transcript.

Please refer to the INDEX for other poems and articles that may be of interest.

© 2013-2026. CP in Mongolia. “Mongolian Poetry 64: On Writing Poetry” is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License. Open access should not be understood as the absence of attribution. Documents linked from this page may be subject to other restrictions. Posted: 31 August 2026. Last updated: 1 September 2026.