sliver of moon
hanging in the sky
sliver of life
soon gone by
Month: March 2018
Don’t Ask by Ch’i-chi
Don’t ask if I’ve ceased wanting anything–
we all know the simile of the drifting clouds.
Excess wouldn’t fit the precepts:
take what comes and you’re never in doubt.
How happy, that worthy Yen!
Even the sage Confucius was poor.
Once you’ve passed the age of understanding
stop trying to change destiny’s course.
translated by Burton Watson
a mountain poem by Han-shan Te-ch’ing
After late spring rain the falling petals swirl
weightlessly celestial scent covers my patched robe
a simple vacant mind has no place to go
resting on a peak I watch the clouds return
translated by Red Pine
from Sent to a Poetry Friend by Ch’i-chi
I thought of you these past fall evenings,
both of us facing the cold lamp, composing.
translated by Burton Watson
from Seeing Off the Mountain Monk Ch’u, Returning to Japan by Chia Tao
While absent from home,
your hair’s turned white;
but at wave’s end
blue hills will arise.
Separated by water,
we’ll be in each other’s thoughts;
but no letters
to distract your quiet life.
translated by Mike O’Connor
The Year Keng-wu, Night of the Fifteenth, Facing the Moon by Ch’i-chi
Sea calm, sky blue, moon just now full–
in my poems I think how cold Hsuan-tsung must be tonight.
The jade rabbit in the moon, if he has a heart, will remember too,
as he looks west and cannot see the old Ch’ang-an.
translated by Burton Watson
The Undertaking by Louise Glück
The darkness lifts, imagine, in your lifetime.
There you are–cased in clean bark you drift
through weaving rushes, fields flooded with cotton.
You are free. The river films with lilies,
shrubs appear, shoots thicken into palm. And now
all fear gives way: the light
looks after you, you feel the waves’ goodwill
as arms widen over the water; Love,
the key is turned. Extend yourself–
it is the Nile, the sun is shining,
everywhere you turn is luck.
“Reading is the sole means by which we slip, involuntarily, often helplessly, into another’s skin, another’s voice, another’s soul.”
another quote from Douglas Moore’s Art of Quotation
“Reading is the sole means by which we slip, involuntarily, often helplessly, into another’s skin, another’s voice, another’s soul.”
from To the Tune “The River Is Red” by Ch’iu Chin
And one day, all under heaven
Will see beautiful free women,
Blooming like fields of flowers,
And bearing brilliant and noble human beings.
translted by Kenneth Reroth & Ling Chung
“Humanity needs dreams to be able to survive… daily existence, even if only for an instant.”
from Douglas Moore’s Art of Quotation
“Humanity needs dreams to be able to survive the miseries of daily existence, even if only for an instant.”
Leonard Durso 