Tag Archives: Audio

Wen Fu 5: “Writing Styles” [文赋五] by Lu Ji [陆机] [w/ Audio]

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Among ten thousand writing styles,
  There's no one standard or measure.
  The styles: many, muddled, and free --
  Form, the unattainable treasure.
 Talent in word-wrangling shows skill.
   Idea conveyance shows craft.
   Writers strive 'twixt have and have not --
   Unyielding in shallow or deep draught.
 An escape artist of fine lines --
   Yet time and space consume in kind.
   Intricacy excites the eye, 
   But frugality soothes the mind. 
 One of few words is not confined.
 Verbose writers drift the Undefined.

The original in Simplified Chinese:

体有万殊，物无一量。
纷纭挥霍，形难为状。
辞程才以效伎，意司契而为匠。
在有无而黾勉，当浅深而不让。
虽离方而遯员，期穷形而尽相。
故夫夸目者尚奢，惬心者贵当。
言穷者无隘，论达者唯旷。

“Chaucer” by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow [w/ Audio]

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An old man in a lodge within a park;
   The chamber walls depicted all around
   With portraitures of huntsman, hawk,
      and hound,
   And the hurt deer. He listeneth to the
      lark,
 Whose song comes with the sunshine
      through the dark
   Of painted glass in leaden lattice bound;
   He listeneth and he laugheth at the
      sound,
   Then writeth in a book like any clerk.
 He is the poet of the dawn, who wrote
   The Canterbury Tales, and his old age
   Made beautiful with song; and as I read
 I heard the crowing cock, I hear the note
   Of lark and linnet, and from every page
   Rise odors of ploughed field or flowery
       mead.

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

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When the green woods laugh with the voice of joy,
 And the dimpling stream runs laughing by;
 When the air does laugh with our merry wit,
 And the green hill laughs with the noise of it;

When the meadows laugh with lively green,
 And the grasshopper laughs in the merry scene,
 When Mary and Susan and Emily
 With their sweet round mouths sing 'Ha, Ha, He!'

When the painted birds laugh in the shade,
 Where our table with cherries and nuts is spread,
 Come live & be merry, and join with me,
 To sing the sweet chorus of 'Ha, Ha, He!'

“Poetry Is a Destructive Force” by Wallace Stevens [w/ Audio]

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That's what misery is,
 Nothing to have at heart.
 It is to have or nothing.

It is a thing to have,
 A lion, an ox in his breast,
 To feel it breathing there.

Corazón, stout dog,
 Young ox, bow-legged bear,
 He tastes its blood, not spit.

He is like a man
 In the body of a violent beast.
 Its muscles are his own. . .

The lion sleeps in the sun.
 Its nose is on its paws.
 It can kill a man.

“Crops” by Walter de la Mare [w/ Audio]

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Farmer Giles has cut his rye;
   Oh my!    Oh my!
 Farmer Bates has cut his wheat;
   Och, the thieving hares in it!

Farmer Turvey's cut his barley;
   Ripe and early, ripe and early.
 And where day breaks, rousing not,
   Farmer Weary's cut his throat.

“Down to Jiangling” [下江陵] by Li Bai [李 白]

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I left Baidi amid ochre clouds --
   Crossed a thousand li by day's end.
 Monkeys howled and chased along each bank;
   My skiff slipped past ten thousand mountains.

The original in Simplified Chinese:

朝辞白帝彩云间
千里江陵一日还
两岸猿声啼不住
轻舟已过万重山

Note: this is poem #269 of the 300 Tang Poems [唐詩三百首.]

Wen Fu 4: “Ekstasis” [文赋四] by Lu Ji [陆机]

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It's all the amusing matters
   That sages admire without bounds.
 Writers find their way through the void --
   Knock on silence to find its sound.
 Silk scroll messages from afar,
   The bard's words surge forth from the heart.
 Words and ash grow to overflow --
   Thoughts transcend depths to become art.
 Flowery fragrance pungently sprawls;
   Plants shoot forth verdant greenery.
 The brush winds swirl to whirlwinds
   Clouds climb above the academy.

Note: I previously posted other translators’ (Barnstone and Chou) version of this poem as The Joy of Words @ https://berniegourley.com/2024/12/31/the-joy-of-words-by-lu-ji-w-audio/

Original poem in Simplified Chinese:

伊兹事之可乐，固圣贤之所钦。
课虚无以责有，叩寂寞而求音。
函绵邈于尺素，吐滂沛乎寸心。
言恢之而弥广，思按之而逾深。
播芳蕤之馥馥，发青条之森森。
粲风飞而猋竖，郁云起乎翰林。

“Tavern” by Edna St. Vincent Millay [w/ Audio]

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I'll keep a little tavern
   Below the high hill's crest,
 Wherein all grey-eyed people
   May sit them down and rest.

There shall be plates a-plenty,
    And mugs to melt the chill
 Of all the grey-eyed people
    Who happen up the hill.

There sound will sleep the traveller,
    And dream his journey's end,
 But I will rouse at midnight
    The falling fire to tend.

Aye, 'tis a curious fancy --
    But all the good I know
 Was taught me out of two grey eyes
    A long time ago.

“The Blossom” by William Blake [w/ Audio]

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Merry, Merry Sparrow!
 Under leaves so green
 A happy Blossom
 Sees you swift as arrow
 Seek your cradle narrow
 Near my Bosom.
  
Pretty, Pretty Robin!
 Under leaves so green
 A happy Blossom
 Hears you sobbing, sobbing,
 Pretty, Pretty Robin,
 Near my bosom.

“Bamboo Grove Cabin” [竹里馆] by Wang Wei [王维] [w/ Audio]

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Sitting alone -- secluded bamboo grove:
   I whistle or pluck my zither;
 People don't know my deep forest;
   Moon and I shine on each other.

Original in Simplified Chinese:

独坐幽篁里
弹琴复长啸
深林人不知
明月来相照