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To what can our life on earth be likened? To a flock of geese, alighting on the snow. Sometimes leaving a trace of their passage.
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Will a moon so bright ever arise again? Drink a cupful of wine and ask of the sky. I don't know where the palace gate of heaven is, Or even the year in which tonight slips by. I want to return riding the whirl-wind! But I Feel afraid that this heaven of jasper and jade Lets in the cold, its palaces rear so high. I shall get up and dance with my own shadow. From life endured among men how far a cry! Round the red pavilion Slanting through the lattices Onto every wakeful eye, Moon, why should you bear a grudge, O why Insist in time of separation so th fill the sky? Men know joy and sorow, parting and reunion; The moon lacks lustre, brightly shines; is al, is less. Perfection was never easily come by. Though miles apart, could men but live for ever Dreaming they shared this moonlight endlessly!
Tr. A. Ayling & D. Mackintosh |
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A fragment moon hangs from the bare tung tree The water clock runs out, all is still Who sees the dim figure come and go alone Misty, indistinct, the shadow of a lone wild goose? Startled, she gets up, looks back With longing no one sees And will not settle on any of the cold branches Along the chill and lonely beach |
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Like a flower, but not a flower No one cares when it falls And lies discarded at the roadside But though Unmoved, I think about The tangle of wounded tendrils Lovely eyes full of sleep About to open,yet Still in dreams, following the wind ten thousand miles In search of love Startled, time and again, by the oriole's cry Do not pity the flower that flies off Grieve for the western garden Its fallen red already beyond mending -- Now, after morning rain What's left? A pond full of broken duckweed If the three parts of spring Two turn to dust One to flowing water Look -- These are not catkins But drop after drop of parted lover's tears |
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The Ynagtze flows east Washing away A thousand ages of great men West of the ramparts -- People say -- Are the fables Red Cliffs of young Chou of the Three Kingdoms Rebellious rocks pierce the sky Frightening waves rip the bank The backwash churns vast snowy swells -- River and mountains like a painting how many heroes passed them, once ... Think back to those years, Chou Yu -- Just married to the younger Chiao -- Brave, brilliant With plumed fan, silk kerchief Laughed and talked While masts and oars vanished to flying ash and smoke! I roam through ancient realms Absurdly moved Turn gray too soon -- A man's life passes like a dream -- Pour out a cup then, to the river, and the moon |
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Ten years living and dead have drawn apart I do nothing to remember But I can not forget Your lonely grave a thousand miles away ... Nowhere can I talk of my sorrow -- Even if we met, how would you know me My face full of dust My hair like snow? In the dark of night, a dream: suddenly, I am home You by the window Doing your hair I look at you and can not speak Your face is streaked by endless tears Year after year must they break my heart These moonlit nights? That low pine grave? |
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Drinking through the night at East Slope, still drunk on waking-up, I return home around midnight. My house-boy snores like thunder, no answer to my knock. Leaning on my stick, listening to the river, I wish this body belonged to someone else. When can I escape this turmoil? In the deep night, with the wind still, the sea calm; I'll find a boat and drift away, to spend my final years afloat, trusting to the river and the sea.
Tr. Chen Li Jen & Mike Farman |
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