Wang Wei
Stopping at Incense Storing Temple
Not know incense store temple
Few enter cloud peaks
Ancient trees no person path
Deep hills what place bell
Spring sound choke sheer rock
Sun colour cold green pines
Dusk empty pool bend
Peace meditation control fierce dragon
I did not know the incense storing temple,
I walked a few miles into the clouded peaks.
No man on the path between the ancient trees,
A bell rang somewhere deep among the hills.
A spring sounded choked, running down steep rocks,
The green pines chilled the sunlight's coloured rays.
Come dusk, at the bend of a deserted pool,
Through meditation I controlled passion's dragon.
Huazi Ridge
Fly bird go no limit
Join mountain again autumn colour
Up down Huazi Ridge
Melancholy feeling what extreme
A bird in flight goes on without limit,
Joined hills are autumn's colours again.
From top to bottom of Huazi Ridge,
Melancholy feeling has no end.
Hut Among the Bamboos
Sitting alone
in the hush of the bamboo grove
I thrum my lute
and whistle lingering notes.
In the secrecy of the wood
no one can hear --
Only the clear moon
comes to shine on me.
Jinzhu Ridge
Wingceltis goldenrain shine empty bend
Fresh and green ripple ripples ripples
Secret enter Shang hill road
Woodcutter not able know
Wingceltis and goldenrain shine at the empty bend,
Fresh and green, rippling ever onward.
A secret road leads up to Shangshan hill,
Even the woodcutter does not know.
A Green Stream.
I have sailed the River of Yellow Flowers,
Borne by the channel of a green stream,
Rounding ten thousand turns through the mountains
On a journey of less than thirty miles....
Rapids hum over heaped rocks;
But where light grows dim in the thick pines,
The surface of an inlet sways with nut-horns
And weeds are lush along the banks.
...Down in my heart I have always been as pure
As this limpid water is....
Oh, to remain on a broad flat rock
And to cast a fishing-line forever!
Bound Home to Mount Song
The limpid river, past its bushes
Running slowly as my chariot,
Becomes a fellow voyager
Returning home with the evening birds.
A ruined city-wall overtops an old ferry,
Autumn sunset floods the peaks.
...Far away, beside Mount Song,
I shall close my door and be at peace.
Farewell
Down horse drink gentleman alcohol
Ask gentleman what place go
Gentleman say not achieve wish
Return lie south mountain near
Still go nothing more ask
White cloud not exhaust time
Dismounting, I offer my friend a cup of wine,
I ask what place he is headed to.
He says he has not achieved his aims,
Is retiring to the southern hills.
Now go, and ask me nothing more,
White clouds will drift on for all time.
Replying to Subprefect Zhang
Old age think good quiet
Everything not concern heart
Self attend without great plan
Empty know return old forest
Pine wind blow undo belt
Hill moon light pluck qin
Gentleman ask end open reason
Fisherman song enter riverbank deep
Now in old age, I know the value of silence,
The world's affairs no longer stir my heart.
Turning to myself, I have no greater plan,
All I can do is return to the forest of old.
Wind from the pine trees blows my sash undone,
The moon shines through the hills; I pluck the qin.
You ask me why the world must rise and fall,
Fishermen sing on the steep banks of the river.
Sometimes I'd walk
Sometimes I'd walk,
walk far from home,
the things I've seen,
and I alone.
Mengcheng Col
New house Mengcheng entrance
Old tree surplus sorrow willow
Come person again for who
Only sorrow former person be
Who will come after, I do not know,
He must feel sorrow for those in the past.
Thinking of My Brothers in Shantung on the Ninth Day of the Ninth Month
Alone now in a strange country,
feeling myself a stranger,
On this bright festival day
I doubly pine for my kinsfolk.
Far away, I know my brothers
will be climbing the heights
With dogwood sprays in their jackets,
and one man missing!
The Cornel Grove
Bear fruit red and green
Again as if flower further open
Hill at if remain guest
Place here cornel cup
When bearing fruit it's red and green,
As if the flowers were budding again.
If a guest remains on the hill,
Set a cup of cornel here.
At the Lake Pavilion
Small barge go to meet honoured guest
Leisurely lake on come
At railing face cup alcohol
On all sides lotus bloom
On a skiff I meet an honoured guest,
Slowly, slowly, it comes across the lake.
Facing at the railing, we drink a cup of wine,
On all sides, lotus flowers are in bloom.
South Hill
Light boat south hill go
North hill vast expanse hard reach
Separate bank see person home
Long way off not recognise
A light boat sets off from the southern hill,
The north is hard to reach across the vastness.
On the other bank, I look for my home,
It cannot be recognised so far off.
Mount Zhongnan
Its massive height near the City of Heaven
Joins a thousand mountains to the corner of the sea.
Clouds, when I look back, close behind me,
Mists, when I enter them, are gone.
A central peak divides the wilds
And weather into many valleys.
...Needing a place to spend the night,
I call to a wood-cutter over the river
The Beautiful Xi Shi
Since beauty is honoured all over the Empire,
How could Xi Shi remain humbly at home? --
Washing clothes at dawn by a southern lake --
And that evening a great lady in a palace of the north:
Lowly one day, no different from the others,
The next day exalted, everyone praising her.
No more would her own hands powder her face
Or arrange on her shoulders a silken robe.
And the more the King loved her, the lovelier she looked,
Blinding him away from wisdom.
...Girls who had once washed silk beside her
Were kept at a distance from her chariot.
And none of the girls in her neighbours' houses
By pursing their brows could copy her beauty.
Harmonizing a Poem, (beside Palace Attendant Guo.)
High beyond the thick wall a tower shines with sunset
Where peach and plum are blooming and the willowcotton flies.
You have heard in your office the court-bell of twilight;
Birds find perches, officials head for home.
Your morning-jade will tinkle as you thread the golden palace;
You will bring the word of Heaven from the closing gates at night.
And I should serve there with you; but being full of years,
I have taken off official robes and am resting from my troubles.
Lament For Meng Hao-Jan
I can never see my old friend again—
The river Han still streams to the east
I might question some old man of his place—
River and hills—empty is Tsaichou.
Birds Calling in the Ravine
I'm idle, as osmanthus flowers fall,
This quiet night in spring, the hill is empty.
The moon comes out and startles the birds on the hill,
They don't stop calling in the spring ravine.
A Song of a Girl from Loyang
There's a girl from Loyang in the door across the street,
She looks fifteen, she may be a little older.
...While her master rides his rapid horse with jade bit an bridle,
Her handmaid brings her cod-fish in a golden plate.
On her painted pavilions, facing red towers,
Cornices are pink and green with peach-bloom and with willow,
Canopies of silk awn her seven-scented chair,
And rare fans shade her, home to her nine-flowered curtains.
Her lord, with rank and wealth and in the bud of life,
Exceeds in munificence the richest men of old.
He favours this girl of lowly birth, he has her taught to dance;
And he gives away his coral-trees to almost anyone.
The wind of dawn just stirs when his nine soft lights go out,
Those nine soft lights like petals in a flying chain of flowers.
Between dances she has barely time for singing over the songs;
No sooner is she dressed again than incense burns before her.
Those she knows in town are only the rich and the lavish,
And day and night she is visiting the hosts of the gayest mansions.
...Who notices the girl from Yue with a face of white jade,
Humble, poor, alone, by the river, washing silk?
Fine Apricot Lodge
Fine apricot cut for roofbeam
Fragrant cogongrass tie for eaves
Not know ridgepole in cloud
Go make people among rain
Fine apricot was cut for the roofbeam,
Fragrant cogongrass tied for the eaves.
I know not when the cloud from this house
Will go to make rain among the people.
A Study
Light cloud pavilion light rain
Dark yard day weary open
Sit look green moss colour
About to on person clothes come
There's light cloud, and drizzle round the pavilion,
In the dark yard, I wearily open a gate.
I sit and look at the colour of green moss,
Ready for people's clothing to pick up.
A View of the Han River
With its three southern branches reaching the Chu border,
And its nine streams touching the gateway of Jing,
This river runs beyond heaven and earth,
Where the colour of mountains both is and is not.
The dwellings of men seem floating along
On ripples of the distant sky --
These beautiful days here in Xiangyang
Make drunken my old mountain heart!
