Li Ch'I
A Farewell to Wei Wan Bound for the Capital
The travellers' parting-song sounds in the dawn.
Last night a first frost came over the river;
And the crying of the wildgeese grieves my sad heart
Bounded by a gloom of cloudy mountains. . . .
Here in the Gate City, day will flush cold
And washing-flails quicken by the gardens at twilight -
How long shall the capital content you,
Where the months and the years so vainly go by?
An Old Air
There once was a man, sent on military missions,
A wanderer, from youth, on the Yu and Yen frontiers.
Under the horses' hoofs he would meet his foes
And, recklessly risking his seven-foot body,
Would slay whoever dared confort
Those moustaches that bristled like porcupine-quills.
. . .There were dark clouds below the hills, there were white clouds above them,
But before a man has served full time, how can he go back?
In eastern Liao a girl was waiting, a girl of fifteen years,
Deft with a guitar, expert in dance and song.
. . . She seems to be fluting, even now, a reed-song of home,
Filling every soldier's eyes with homesick tears.
A Farewell to My Friend Ch'en Chang-Fu
In the Fourth-month the south wind blows plains of yellow barley,
Date-flowers have not faded yet and lakka-leaves are long.
The green peak that we left at dawn we still can see at evening,
While our horses whinny on the road, eager to turn homeward.
. . . Ch'en, my friend, you have always been a great and good man,
With your dragon's moustache , tiger's eyebrows and your massive forehead.
In your bosom you have shelved away ten thousand volumes.
You have held your head high, never bowed it in the dust.
. . . After buying us wine and pledging us, here at the eastern gate,
And taking things as lightly as a wildgoose feather,
Flat you lie, tipsy, forgetting the white sun;
But now and then you open your eyes and gaze at a high lone cloud.
. . . The tide-head of the long river joins the darkening sky.
The ferryman beaches his boat. It has grown too late to sail.
And people on their way from Cheng cannot go home,
And people from Lo-yang sigh with disappointment.
. . . I have heard about the many friend around your woodland dwelling.
Yesterday you were dismissed. Are they your friends today?
A Lute Song
Our host, providing abundant wine to make the night mellow,
Asks his guest from Yang-chou to play for us on the lute.
Toward the moon that whitens the city-wall, black crows are flying,
Front is on ten thousand trees, and the wind blows through our clothes;
But a copper stove had added its light to that of flowery candles,
And the lute plays The Green Water, and then The Queen of Ch'u.
Once it has begun to play, there is no other sound:
A spell is on the banquet, while the stars grow thin. . . .
But three hundred miles from here, in Huai, official duties await him,
And so it's farewell, and the road again, under