Category Archives: Lyric

Lament 4 [感遇四] by Zhang Jiuling [张九龄] [w/ Audio]

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South of Yangtze, stands of red tangerine
 Can endure winter while remaining green.
 Is it that the weather there is so warm?
 No. Their nature 's to bear a winter storm.
 What might well serve the joyful traveler
 Will be loathsome peril to passengers.
 Fate factors in chance and situation --
 Not playing around in cyclic rotation.
 You may cultivate crops however you please,
 But should heed shade thrown by mountains & trees.

This is the fourth poem in 300 Tang Poems [唐诗三百首] and the final poem of a quartet that opens that collection. The original in Simplified Chinese is:

江南有丹橘， 经冬犹绿林；
岂伊地气暖？ 自有岁寒心。
可以荐嘉客， 奈何阻重深！
运命惟所遇， 循环不可寻。 
徒言树桃李， 此木岂无阴？

“Romance” by Edgar Allan Poe [w/ Audio]

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Romance, who loves to nod and sing,
 With drowsy head and folded wing,
 Among the green leaves as they shake
 Far down within some shadowy lake,
 To me a painted paroquet
 Hath been—a most familiar bird—
 Taught me my alphabet to say—
 To lisp my very earliest word
 While in the wild wood I did lie,
 A child—with a most knowing eye.
 Of late, eternal Condor years
 So shake the very Heaven on high
 With tumult as they thunder by,
 I have no time for idle cares
 Through gazing on the unquiet sky.
 And when an hour with calmer wings
 Its down upon my spirit flings—
 That little time with lyre and rhyme
 To while away—forbidden things!
 My heart would feel to be a crime
 Unless it trembled with the strings.

“Down By the Salley Gardens” by William Butler Yeats [w/ Audio]

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Down by the salley gardens
   my love and I did meet;
She passed the salley gardens
   with little snow-white feet.
She bid me take love easy,
   as the leaves grow on the tree;
But I, being young and foolish,
   with her would not agree.

In a field by the river
   my love and I did stand,
And on my leaning shoulder
   she laid her snow-white hand.
She bid me take life easy,
   as the grass grows on the weirs;
But I was young and foolish,
   and now am full of tears.

Wen Fu 9 [文赋九] “The Whip” by Lu Ji [陆机] [w/ Audio]

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Language can be complex, reason may sprawl,
  And words don't always seem to point the way.
  Extremes aren't always clear and distinct.
  Overhauls are not always an upgrade.
  The gist may dwell in a key phrase or two --
  Those words the whip that make it race or stay.
  Though multitudinous words are in place
  They must do more than roar, hiss, or bray.
  Overuse of the whip exhausts the horse --
  Keep the impulse to whip too much at bay.

The original lines in Simplified Chinese are: 

或文繁理富，    而意不指适。
极无两致，        尽不可益。
立片言而居要，乃一篇之警策。
虽众辞之有条，必待兹而效绩。
亮功多而累寡，故取足而不易。

Little Dragon [Lyric Poem]

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Ancient temple carved with features:
 Beasts, men, gods and mythic creatures.
 Imagine my surprise when I 
 Came face-to-face with this lil’ guy.

The lizard did his level best
 To stay stock still with puffed-out chest.
 To pass for a chiseled dragon,
 But couldn’t keep its tail from waggin’.

“The Soul has Bandaged moments” (360) by Emily Dickinson [w/ Audio]

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The Soul has Bandaged moments -
   When too appalled to stir -
 She feels some ghastly Fright come up
   And stop to look at her -

Salute her, with long fingers -
   Caress her freezing hair -
 Sip, Goblin, from the very lips
   The Lover - hovered - o'er -
 Unworthy, that a thought so mean
   Accost a Theme - so - fair -

The soul has moments of escape -
   When bursting all the doors -
 She dances like a Bomb, abroad,
   And swings opon the Hours,

As do the Bee - delirious borne -
   Long Dungeoned from his Rose -
 Touch Liberty - then know no more -
   But Noon, and Paradise

The Soul's retaken moments -
   When, Felon led along,
 With shackles on the plumed feet,
   And staples, in the song,

The Horror welcomes her, again,
 These, are not brayed of Tongue -

Lament 3 [感遇三] by Zhang Jiuling [张九龄] [w/ Audio]

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Alone, the hermit returns home to sleep.
 He's cleansed of cares by way of solitude.
 He gives thanks and praise to the geese on high
 For lifting feelings to grand altitude.
 Day or night, his mind holds no intentions,
 Who can sense his energy, so subdued?
 His flight and submergence self-limited,
 Where can he find calm, and still be renewed?

This is the third poem in 300 Tang Poems [唐诗三百首] as well as the third of a quartet of poems entitled Gǎn Yù [感遇] that open the collection. The original in Simplified Chinese is:

幽人归独卧， 滞虑洗孤清。
持此谢高鸟， 因之传远情。
日夕怀空意， 人谁感至精？
飞沉理自隔， 何所慰吾诚？

“From a Railway Carriage” by Robert Louis Stevenson [w/ Audio]

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Faster than fairies, faster than witches,
 Bridges and houses, hedges and ditches;
 And charging along like troops in a battle,
 All through the meadows the horses and cattle:
 All of the sights of the hill and the plain
 Fly as thick as driving rain;
 And ever again, in the wink of an eye,
 Painted stations whistle by.

Here is a child who clambers and scrambles,
 All by himself and gathering brambles;
 Here is a tramp who stands and gazes;
 And there is the green for stringing the daisies!
 Here is a cart run away in the road
 Lumping along with man and load;
 And here is a mill and there is a river:
 Each a glimpse and gone for ever!

“Mad Song” by William Blake [w/ Audio]

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The wild winds weep, 
         And the night is a-cold;
 Come hither, Sleep,
         And my griefs infold:
 But lo! the morning peeps
         Over the eastern steeps,
 And the rustling birds of dawn
 The earth do scorn.

Lo! to the vault
         Of paved heaven,
 With sorrow fraught
         My notes are driven:
 They strike the ear of night,
         Make weep the eyes of day;
 They make mad the roaring winds,
         And with tempests play.

Like a fiend in a cloud 
         With howling woe,
  After night I do croud,
         And with night will go;
  I turn my back to the east,
  From whence comforts have increas'd;
  For light doth seize my brain
  With frantic pain.

“The Aim Was Song” by Robert Frost [w/ Audio]

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Before man came to blow it right
     The wind once blew itself untaught,
And did its loudest day and night
     In any rough place where it caught.
 
Man came to tell it what was wrong:
     It hadn’t found the place to blow;
It blew too hard—the aim was song.
     And listen—how it ought to go!
 
He took a little in his mouth,
     And held it long enough for north
To be converted into south,
     And then by measure blew it forth.
 
By measure. It was word and note,
     The wind the wind had meant to be—
A little through the lips and throat.
     The aim was song—the wind could see.