My Spring sleep is unswayed by dawn --
Though birds are heard through screen, still drawn.
Recalling night sounds of rain and wind,
I wonder how the flowers have thinned?
Original in Chinese:
春眠不覺曉，
處處聞啼鳥。
夜來風雨聲，
花落知多少。
Stream-washed leaves are glistening.
Someone is boiling cocoons.
Workers gossip, I'm listening.
Dim-eyed man with a cane spoons
Food into a bowl, bending
To pass it before I swoon.
I ask when the bean leaves yellow.
Every time I have started for the Yellow Flower River,
I have gone down the Blue-Green Stream,
Following the hills, making ten thousand turnings.
We go along rapidly, but advance scarcely one hundred li.
We are in the midst of a noise of water,
Of the confused and mingled sounds of water broken by stones,
And in the deep darkness of pine-trees.
Rocked, rocked,
Moving on and on,
We float past water-chestnuts
Into a still clearness reflecting reeds and rushes.
My heart is clean and white as silk;
it has already achieved Peace;
It is smooth as the placid river.
I long to stay here, curled up on the rocks,
Dropping my fish-line forever.
NOTE: This version was translated by Florence Ayscough and adapted by Amy Lowell in the book: Fir-Flower Tablets (1921) New York: Houghton Mifflin, p. 123
Above the blossoms sing the orioles:
Kuan kuan, their clear notes.
The girl with a face like jade
Strums to them on her lute.
Never does she tire of playing --
Youth is the time for tender thoughts.
When the flowers scatter and the birds fly off
Her tears will fall in the spring wind.
Translated of Burton Watson in: Cold Mountain: 100 poems by the T’ang poet Han-Shan, New York: Columbia University Press, p. 22
At the beginning there was a huge drop of milk.
Then Doondari came and he created the stone.
Then the stone created iron;
And iron created fire;
And fire created water;
And water created air.
Then Doondari descended the second time.
And he took the five elements
And he shaped them into man.
But man was proud.
Then Doondari created blindness,
and blindness defeated man.
But when blindness became too proud,
Doondari created sleep,
and sleep defeated blindness;
But when sleep became too proud,
Doondari created worry,
and worry defeated sleep;
But when worry became too proud,
Doondari created death,
and death defeated worry.
But then death became too proud,
Doondari descended for the third time,
And he came as Gueno, the eternal one.
And Gueno defeated death.
NOTE: The Fulani (also known as Fula and Fulbe) are a West African herding tribe that live in Mali, Niger, Nigeria, Guinea, and Senegal.
I'm happy to be a free Yogi,
growing evermore into inner happiness.
I can have sex with many women
as it helps them find the path of liberation.
Outwardly I'm a fool
and inwardly I live a clear spiritual path.
Outwardly I enjoy wine and women
and inwardly I work for the benefit of all beings.
Outwardly I live for my pleasure
and inwardly I do everything in the right moment.
Outwardly I'm a ragged beggar
and inwardly a blissful Buddha.
Zenith
These griefs
These gardens on and on
Where the toad croons a tender cry skyblue
The hind of silence startled races by
The nightingale that love has bruised sings in
Your body's bush on which I've picked each rose
Our hearts hang from the same pomegranate bough
And in our gaze pomegranate blossoms blow
That falling one by one have strewn the road
Translator: Harry Duncan
The Art of Writing: Teachings of the Chinese Masters by Tony Barnstone
I came once to Tiantai,
And back ten-thousand times.
Like clouds or water tides:
Drift and flow, come and go.
I stroll, free of worry,
Buddha's Path - in no hurry.
While the world's forked roads
Lead men to fret and scurry.
In Spring, the waters rise --
Shore grass sways with breezes,
And geese drift right beside;
Boats glide as the stream pleases.
Yon pagoda looks far,
but feels quite close.
Streamside, one feels a chill.
Fields have yet to be plowed --
Not while the torrents spill.
Mulberry limbs are bowed.
Soon we'll have a taste,
and harvest cocoons.
NOTE: The title of this poem is 蝶 戀 花. Xu Yuanchong uses the quite literal “Butterflies in Love with Flowers” as his translated title. I chose differently because a wet Spring is the throughline of the poem and, well, there are no explicit butterflies (or flowers) in the poem [only their potential.] Of course, maybe that’s exactly why the original is a great title.
Tiger Riding for Beginners 