Song of the Ages (cont.)

The world spun,

Spun so fast,

But time passes so slow.

Through the lush gardens,

Over the Bo Tree,

We fled.

You were a man,

Ten-thousand in one,

By name.

A handsome man, virtuous and good,

You brought honor to your family.

You helped build the Emperor’s wall that would

Defend all of China. Yet it could not be completed

Unless a sacrificed could

Be produced to bind a

Guardian soul to the stones.

Through the lush gardens,

Over Quigcheng Mountain,

We fled.

I was a woman,

Once more

The lotus-bloom.

A woman born not of woman’s blood,

But hatched from out a pumpkin shell

And raised in beauty, like the cherry bud.

Then one night, you came to me-

Weary from hiding and covered in mud,

But my heart soared like a dragon’s flight.

And into wedlock we were joined.

We fled into the night, my love.

But the Emperor’s men hunted us down

For your name, ‘ten-thousand’.

You were an obvious sacrifice to the spirits.

The wall now stands, unbeatable forever,

While you have fallen

And no one knows where your bones lie.

I mourned you, my love.

Your murderer asked for my hand,

And imperial will I could not deny;

I asked him to honor you

For forty-nine days of mourning.

And on the eve of the forty-ninth day,

I denounced his cruelty and cast myself into the river.