Being able to read Chinese, even if is dumbed-down stories for beginners and I still have to look words up every few sentences. But it feels like I’ve stumbled upon a door to a whole new universe.
PROMPT: Excited
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Category Archives: Literature
“A Decade” by Amy Lowell [w/ Audio]
When you came, you were like red wine and honey,
And the taste of you burnt my mouth with its sweetness.
Now you are like morning bread,
Smooth and pleasant.
I hardly taste you at all for I know your savour,
But I am completely nourished.
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“To a Taoist Hermit on Mt. Quanjiao” [寄全椒山中道士] by Wei Yingwu [韦应物]
Today, my office is chilly.
At once, I miss my mountain chum,
Who bound firewood in the valley,
Bringing it back to boil white stones.
I wish I could ladle some wine
To comfort on this stormy night.
But fallen leaves fill mountain hollows,
How could I find a track to follow?
This is poem #29 from the 300 Tang Poems [唐诗三百首], entitled 寄全椒山中道士. The original poem in Simplified Chinese is:
今朝郡斋冷， 忽念山中客；
涧底束荆薪， 归来煮白石。
欲持一瓢酒， 远慰风雨夕。
落叶满空山， 何处寻行迹？
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“Precept-Breaking Monk” by Ikkyū [w/ Audio]
A precept-breaking monk for eighty years --
still, I'm ashamed of Zen that ignores cause and effect.
Sickness is the result of past karma.
Now how can I honor my endless connections?
Translation by Kazuaki Tanahashi and David Schneider in: Essential Zen. 1994. HarperSanFrancisco. p. 126.
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“The Fish” by William Butler Yeats [w/ Audio]
Although you hide in the ebb and flow
Of the pale tide when the moon has set,
The people of coming days will know
About the casting out of my net,
And how you have leaped times out of mind
Over the little silver cords,
And think that you were hard and unkind,
And blame you with many bitter words.
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“So set its Sun in Thee” (808) by Emily Dickinson [w/ Audio]
So set its Sun in Thee
What Day be dark to me —
What Distance — far —
So I the Ships may see
That touch — how seldomly —
Thy Shore?
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“Wanderers” by Walter de la Mare [w/ Audio]
Wide are the meadows of night,
And daisies are shinng there,
Tossing their lovely dews,
Lustrous and fair;
And through these sweet fields go,
Wanderers amid the stars --
Venus, Mercury, Uranus, Neptune,
Saturn, Jupiter, Mars.
'Tired in their silver, they move,
And circling, whisper and say,
Fair are the blossoming meads of delight
Through which we stray.
Note: the word “shinng” seems to be spelled that way in all sources. I don’t know whether it was a typo, dialectic, or a heterodox spelling.
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Wen Fu 12 [文赋十二] “Idiosyncrasy” by Lu Ji [陆机] [w/ Audio]
Thoughts conveyed by way of short verse
May degrade in eccentricity.
With bowed head, lonely and friendless.
Face up, vast sky where all is free.
Like one string stretched to perfect pitch,
But lacking all resonancy.
NOTES: Earlier I posted a translation by Tony Barnstone and Chou Ping, entitled A One-String Harp that was contained in The Art of Writing (Boston: Shambhala; p. 15) This, however, is my own translation. The original poem in Simplified Chinese is:
或讬言于短韵，对穷迹而孤兴。
俯寂寞而无友，仰寥廓而莫承。
譬偏弦之独张，含清唱而靡应。
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Sonnet 53 by William Shakespeare [w/ Audio]
What is your substance, whereof are you made,
That millions of strange shadows on you tend?
Since every one hath, every one, one shade,
And you, but one, can every shadow lend.
Describe Adonis, and the counterfeit
Is poorly imitated after you;
On Helen's cheek all art of beauty set,
And you in Grecian tires are painted new.
Speak of the spring and foison of the year:
The one doth shadow of your beauty show,
The other as your bounty doth appear;
And you in every blessèd shape we know.
In all external grace you have some part,
But you like none, none you, for constant heart.
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“King Trisanku” by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow [w/ Audio]
Viswamitra the Magician,
By his spells and incantations,
Up to Indra's realms elysian
Raised Trisanku, king of nations.
Indra and the gods offended
Hurled him downward, and descending
In the air he hung suspended,
With these equal powers contending.
Thus by aspirations lifted,
By misgivings downward driven,
Human hearts are tossed and drifted
Midway between earth and heaven.
Tiger Riding for Beginners 