Spring fades. Why should I suffer so much from homesickness?
I am ill. Combing my long hair exasperates me.
Under the roof beams the swallows chatter too much all day long.
A soft breeze fills the curtains with the perfume of roses.
translated by Kenneth Rexroth & Ling Chung
12th Century Chinese poetry
An End to Spring by Li Ch’ing-chao
At spring’s end, I long for home,
feverish, my tangled hair uncombed.
All day, swallows squabble in the eaves.
Breezes bring the scent of roses through the screen.
translated by Sam Hamill
Sand of the Washing Stream by Li Ch’ing-chao
Beyond barred windows,
shadows cover the garden,
shadows slide over the curtain
as I play my lute in silence.
Distant mountains stretch the sunset,
breezes bring clouds and rain.
The pear blossoms fade and die,
and I can’t keep them from falling.
translated by Sam Hamill
from Clear Bright by Li Ch’ing-chao
My friend, while you’re alive
And have wine, use it to get drunk.
There’ll be no second helpings
When you get to the Nine Springs.
translated by Kenneth Rexroth
“Fallen faded petals” by Li Ch’ing-chao
Fallen faded petals the color of my rouge. . .
One year, another spring,
willow catkins lightly fly, bamboo shoots become bamboo
and alone and sad I face the garden’s new-sent green.
But though he’s not done roaming, that time must be near.
In a clear dream of last year come from a thousand miles
cloudy city, winding streams, ice on the ponds
for a while I gazed on my friend.
translated by James Cryer
Tune: “Pure Serene Music” by Li Ch’ing-chao
Year after year in the snow
we’d pick plum blossoms while we drank,
Pulling at the petals to no good purpose,
drenching our clothes with pure white tears.
This year I’m at the end of the world,
strand by strand my hair turns grey.
Judging by the force of the evening wind
plum blossoms will be hard to come by.
translated by Eugene Eoyang
Thoughts from the Women’s Quarters by Li Ch’ing-chao
On her face, hibiscus lovely, an incipient smile.
Poised in flight, the jeweled duck’s beak. Incense wreathed
eyes alight, beneath the quilt she suspects
his frivolity hides a more expressive depth;
folds his elegant letter,
places it next her secret heart.
When the moon has gone,
the flowers in shadow,
I will come again.
translated by James Cryer
from Long Ago I Lived in the Country by Su Tung-p’o
But those days are gone—I see them only in a painting.
No one believes me when I say I regret
not staying a herdsman all my life.
translated by Burton Watson
because Paol Soren asked: Sorrow of Departure to the Tune “Cutting a Flowering Plum Branch” by Li Ch’ing-chao
Red lotus incense fades on
The jeweled curtain. Autumn
Comes again. Gently I open
My silk dress and float alone
On the orchid boat. Who can
Take a letter beyond the clouds?
Only the wild geese come back
And write their ideograms
On the sky under the full
Moon that floods the West Chamber.
Flowers, after their kind, flutter
And scatter. Water after
Its nature, when spilt, at last
Gathers again in one place.
Creatures of the same species
Long for each other. But we
Are far apart and I have
Grown learned in sorrow.
Nothing can make it dissolve
And go away. One moment
It is on my eyebrows.
The next, it weighs on my heart.
translated by Kenneth Rexroth & Ling Chung
New Year’s Eve by Hsin Ch’i-chi
In the east wind last night a thousand trees burst forth
showered down
a rain of stars
jeweled horses and carriages and incense filled the road
the tremulous sound of a phoenix flute
the transforming glow of a jade vase
all night lanterns swayed
and she of the moth eyebrows and flower-decked hair
of laughter that beguiles and the subtlest of perfumes
whom I have searched for in crowds a hundred times
as I turned my head
she was there
where the lantern light was faint
translated by Red Pine
Leonard Durso 